


the other fifty-one

by bluecarrot



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, F/M, Gen, Hamburr, Light BDSM, Light Bondage, M/M, Menstruation, Multi, OT3, Other, Polyamory, Selkies, The Reynolds Pamphlet, Threesome - F/M/M, Trans Alex, sort of, what a fucking mess seriously
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2018-04-18
Packaged: 2018-09-17 02:58:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 55
Words: 30,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9301058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluecarrot/pseuds/bluecarrot
Summary: a collection of tiny and not-so-tiny Hamilton fic.





	1. the one where Eliza requests a divorce.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AU where Angry Eliza turns to Feminist Burr for a divorce

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written Jan 2017.

Eliza Hamilton slammed the Reynolds Pamphlet down on the desk. “Mr Burr, I am here for your assistance.”

Even upside-down, Burr could read the name of the publication. He dragged his gaze up to her face – it was resolute – considered the firm set of her shoulders and the straight line of her back – and rose from his desk, coming around it to face her. “Please go on.”

“You’re a lawyer.”

He inclined his head.

“You got that woman – that – that _Reynolds_ – you convinced the courts to grant her a divorce.”

He let two beats pass, as if waiting to enter a _contre-dance_ , before he said: “Ample evidence, including eyewitnesses, proved James Reynolds to be physically abusive to his wife and daughter. Are you suggesting –”

She shook her head. “My husband published a book detailing his extramarital – _experiences._ Is there not evidence in those pages?”

“Are you asking if the pamphlet would be sufficient justification for a legal dissolution of your union, Mrs Hamilton? Because I could argue your case – but judges make up their own minds, and your husband’s situation in our nation is particular.” As he spoke, he leaned against the desk and spread his hands: _he is beloved, he is powerful, what can I do._

Eliza bit her lip.

Burr shifted around the static form of her body and gently shut the door. “Or,” he said, “are you asking if you have just and right cause to leave him? Because that is rather a different conversation."


	2. the one where Alex gets his first period.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> alex hamilton gets a period. his first one.  
> eliza is not entirely sympathetic.
> 
> (i had an idea of alex being a trans-lady, here, but that doesn't make much logic. what even is biology, idk. this is just a nonsensical bit of fluff, okay? we two were complaining about menstruation, and then ...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 17 January 2017.

"Eliza? Eliza? Can you come and help me?"

A minute later she appeared, looking rather frazzled. "Alex. More tea?"

"Can you get me another pillow? And fix the heating pad."

She adjusted the pillows already there, fixed the heating pad, checked the level of tea, fetched another book from across the room, and drew the curtains shut. "Better?"

Alex whined. "This is terrible. You don't understand."

" _Really_ ," said Eliza. "And what exactly don't I understand? i have had fifteen years of monthly periods, you know."

"Oh, don't be so smug. I'm in PAIN."

She sat down on the edge of the bed. "I know."

"It feels like my insides want to go for a walk across the room. And my legs hurt, and my back hurts, and I'm sa-ad ..."  His voice broke. 

Eliza, not smiling at all, brushed his hair back. "Do you need some chocolate?"

He snuffled. He was a mess; he looked pathetic. "Could you? I really feel like shit."

She could.


	3. the one where Burr is lightly gagged

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hamburr SMUT.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 18 October 2016.

 

Alex liked this. He liked how Burr reacted under his hands; he liked taking him down slowly, watching him fight and lose and regain himself, afterwards, the softness leaving his eyes far before it fell out of his face, as if he wasn’t even aware of his own expression, as if he couldn’t control it around Alex. 

He was greedy; he’d always known it.

Eliza asked once what he did on these late nights. “Work,” he’d said, simply, letting the word stretch and swell and encompass everything he aspired to be – as though touching Burr, fucking Burr, was part and parcel of growing into political power. 

Maybe it was. Maybe they could control the world, the two of them. Burr wouldn’t ever let Alex pull his strings – and Alex was not one to play puppet-master – but they agreed on more than they disagreed, he thought. Guessed. Hoped.

He took a handkerchief and pressed it against Burr’s mouth and it opened for him – oh he liked to see him like this, oh he liked to see him yearning – and he closed his lips around the gag – and Alex kissed him. 

Kissing was wrong. Kissing was too intimate. He had to control himself, he thought. He would do so – he _would_ – 

But not quite yet. 

Burr flinched and Alex laughed. He rubbed his thumbs at his hips. “Here?”

“Mmmph,” said Burr, through the handkerchief that he could have spit out, did not spit out.

“Or here?” He tugged a little; Burr made a sharp noise.

“Maybe later,” said Alex. He straightened up; he ran his hands over Burr’s neck, feeling the pulse at his throat, feeling the way his breath responded. "How long do you have with me, Aaron?“

A growl, and something that sounded very much like "Don’t call me that.”

“Should I make you late for your meeting, Aaron?” He kept his eyes on Burr’s, keeping him still; his hand dropped down low and rubbed. “Or should I let you go on time, and humiliated?”

Burr pushed out the gag and swore. “Fuck you, Hamilton –”

“Absolutely not, if you misbehave.” He stepped back; he was angry now too.

“Come here. Come closer.”

“No. Why?" 

"I want to touch you.” His voice was low, angry.

“No,” said Hamilton, aching for it – not just the feeling of rough skin and heat and friction but Burr wanting him, Burr touching him. Again he said _“No--"_

 


	4. in which we are marked with our death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> instead of birth-marks, have death-marks: your body shows in advance how you will die. vivid lines for stabwounds, for example, or no mark at all if you die in sickness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 12/27/2016.

The first time they’re together, Burr sees it. Hard to miss, really. It’s large, bigger than his fingers splayed apart, and it reaches up from the top rise of Alexander’s hip to the edge of his ribs in back.

The entrance wound is barely noticeable: a round puckered scar.

Burr touches it hesitantly, he’s not sure what to say or if he is allowed to say anything at all, but Hamilton laughs it off: “Someone will get really, really angry at me.”

Infatuated as he is, giddy as he is, even then Burr thinks: _Maybe you deserve it._

“Maybe it’s a mistake,” he says instead, because he wants this man in his bed a while longer at least, and he can guess at the temper that must exist underneath Alexander’s quick laughter and easy ramblings. “Maybe you get caught in cross-fire.”

Alex shakes his head, starts to speak, changes his mind. He pulls Aaron against him instead and they don’t bother to continue on a topic that neither is really willing to address.

 

 

“ _You_ don’t have any marks,” says Alexander, later, after he’s made a thorough investigation of the body in question. “What does that mean? Will you die peacefully, in bed?” He sounds scornful; he sounds envious.

Burr shakes his head, remembers that the candles are out, and says aloud: “It doesn’t mean anything. I could be choked to death, or bludgeoned, or drowned – none of those would leave a death-mark -- ”

“You’re certainly cheerful tonight.”

“You brought it up.”

“Forget I asked,” says Hamilton.

Burr wishes they hadn’t let the candles burn down; he would like to see that face. He wants to see what Alexander is hiding. “Alex,” he says, and reaches out – but Alex turns away.


	5. in which there is a threesome.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliza and Alex -- and Burr? WTF?
> 
> THIS IS REASONABLY EXPLICIT.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 16 January 2017.

Eliza's hair was loose already, let down from its customary knot of braids; it seemed self-consciously intimate, almost forward, though she'd only intended to expediate.

Burr didn't like it; that was obvious. He brushed back a lock that had fallen down over her shoulder, managing to do it without even touching her. But now a warm crescent of skin was exposed above the edging lace on her nightgown. She felt him looking. It shifted with her breath. Her breath, she thought. Her  breasts .

He bent his head and kissed it.

When he looked up, she was smiling at him. He frowned.

Her smile dropped away. "You don't have to do this."

"He has to do this," said Hamilton, sitting on a chair across the room and visibly impatient.

Eliza and Burr said, simultaneous: "Alexander,  shut up."

Burr frowned again. "I just think --"

"Oh for fuck's  sake ," said Eliza, and kissed Burr. When it seemed safe, she added tongue. When he shifted against the bed, she pressed herself harder.

He pulled away. "I'm still not entirely sure."

So Eliza kissed him again -- more slowly this time, and she didn't let him go until he had gasped ever-so-slightly. Too quiet for Alex to hear, probably, but this wasn't about Alexander. Not really. So she let her hand run up Burr's leg above the knee, and she appreciated how his eyes shuttered and returned, and she liked his shiver of self-control, and she liked Alexander's soft curse of frustration, alone and watching from his chair -- oh, she did like that!

He moved slow, this Aaron Burr, and that was nice too -- and she felt the moment when apprehension or uncertainty dropped away and changed to conscious desire. He was hardening now; he rubbed it a little, pulling her closer with a hand low at her back, and she whimpered. He heard it. He smiled. He bit her neck and found a spot that made her arch, and when she ran her mouth along his collarbone, tugging down his shirt to show more give her more let her taste more, he pressed his c--k forward against her, and it was so good, so good, still separated by the fabric of his trousers and her shift and still so good.

"Hurry  up ," said Alex.

She'd forgotten him. "Don't you dare," said Eliza. "You take your time."

"I intend to," said Burr, but his left hand raised up to cradle her head -- gently, softly -- and his other hand dropped down to draw a line up from her calf to her knee, from the knee to the thigh, watching her face all the while.

She said to him, a whisper in his ear: "Yes."

"Yes," he said, and found her wet.

Across the room Hamilton swore again, but neither of them was listening anymore.


	6. in which there is a door that locks.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> modern college-age AU with HamBurr roommates.  
> and a power outage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 20 January 2017.  
> a writing exercise in writing like @holograms. (i did a poor job.)

The first time Aaron Burr meets Alex Hamilton, he thinks his life might be over. How can he possibly spend the next nine months in one twelve-by-fourteen-foot room with this kid? Hamilton will kill him. Or worse, Aaron will kill Hamilton, and then he'll be sent to an even smaller room, and he'll never finish school.

Hamilton is just too much. He's too everything. Too loud, too confident, too popular, too energetic, and too smart for his own good. Definitely he's too smart. Because when Aaron stacks up his textbooks and a few pens and takes his keys and heads out the door, Alex pulls a headphone out of his ear and says: "If you need me to stop humming, you can say so."

Aaron doesn't kill him this time either -- even though he has asked, repeatedly. (Alex always stops, Burr gives him that. It's never very long before he starts again.) He shifts the stack of books more comfortably against his hip and says "It's okay. I'm gonna go study downstairs. See you."

And he's gone before Alex can say anything.

 

The laundry room is hot and musty. Nobody ever comes here to study except Burr. The rattling machines don't disrupt his focus; it's a lullaby in its way. A white noise.

And absolutely no Alexander.

\-- For almost ten minutes.

Burr's only made it through the first few pages of his tort case book. Alex comes in with a full load and drops it on the ground, making Burr almost fall off the dryer he was sitting on. "Crap, I'm sorry! I didn't know you were here!"

"I'm studying."

"I see that. I'm doing laundry."

"I see that," says Burr. He's being as patient as he can but it's difficult, when Hamilton is so near. He's never understood why Alex puts him on edge. Sometimes he thinks they'd get along, if they could just ... talk.

For a wonder, Alex doesn't want to talk. He stuffs the machine full of clothes -- too full, Burr thinks. He feeds it half a roll of quarters and turns it on (Clunk. Clunk) and turns to go -- but his hand isn't even on the doorhandle when there's a noise like water running from a bathtub and the power goes out.

The emergency lights are on, a creepy orange glow. 

Alex and Burr look at each other. 

Neither one of them speaks.

Alex tries the door handle.

It is, of course, inoperable -- the key-card system is electric, and doesn't run off whatever emergency voltage powers the sparse lights.

Burr shuts his eyes, admitting defeat. He can't compete with Hamilton; it's impossible. No matter what he does, the universe will conspire against him.

Alex hoists himself up on to his washer and idly kicks it with his feet. Finally Burr can't stand it anymore. "What do you have in there? What was making that noise?"

"Tennies. Look, you can study. I won't say anything."

So Burr tries to study -- but it's hot. It's very hot. It shouldn't be getting warmer in here without the dryers running, but one glance and he can tell Alex feels it too; his cheeks are flushed and he keeps looking over at Burr as if he wants to say something but doesn't quite dare.

And then Hamilton takes off his shirt, and Burr's mouth goes dry. He manages to say "What are you doing?"

Alex says, in a very annoyed voice, "It's hot, Burr." And then he hops down off the washer and lays down on the tile and moans, and it's absolutely enchanting. How is Burr supposed to study torts?

He tries to do it anyway for a while, and then he gives up and just works on keeping himself from staring at the ponytailed man lying half-naked on the floor. He thinks he's doing okay at it too, until he realizes he's been staring. Fine. Fine.

He sits on the floor near Alex -- not too near, it's still quite warm.

"Better?"

"Better."

Alex says: "You could take off your shirt, too."

Burr snaps: "Why don't you make me, Hamilton?"

And Alex sits up, eyes flashing. "I could make you like it, Aaron Burr."

"I just wanted to study --"

And Alex kisses him, and when that's not having enough of an affect he bites Burr's lip, and when Burr gives in and moans and kisses back (this is what he wanted, how did Alex know, how did he know, that bastard -- was he planning this somehow?), Alex bites his top lip too -- and moves on to taste the sweat collecting in the hollows of his neck and his throat.

Burr just wants to touch Alex, finally. He didn't know he wanted it before but now it's here, he can't help it. He pushes him down and straddles him. Alex lets up a throaty laugh and thrusts upward and Burr rubs back in response, his hand slipping between their legs, brushing both of them and not really doing more than teasing either one. He's nibbling and sucking and pinching at Hamilton's bare skin and that lovely man is actually whimpering and arching under him and Hamilton's got his hand on Burr's thigh, right below his ass, he's digging in his nails and coming deliciously close to some very deserving areas and goddamn him really but Burr has never had so much fun in the laundry room before --

And the power flicks back on with a horrible surge and pop, Alex's washing machine starts up again ("clunk. Clunk.") and someone rattles at the door.

Burr jumps up at once.

Alex gets his shirt and has mostly covered himself when the maintenance guy comes in.

He blinks at them both.

"Pardon me," says the guy.

"Pardon us," says Burr. 

He grabs his books in one hand and takes Alex by the other hand, and they go together back upstairs -- where there's a bed -- and a door that properly locks.


	7. the one in which there is post-election grief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> from [this post](http://littledeconstruction.tumblr.com/post/152965955080/okay-first-of-all-the-biggest-hug-from-france), with pinkconsultingsociopath, immediately after the 2016 election.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 9 November 2016.

... Aaron usually being the Calm Center Of Rational Thinking in the squad but losing his s h i t over this election

because Laf was crying all night and Herc is drinking and Laurens locked himself in the bathroom and Alex, his Alex, he couldn’t even _talk_ ; he just started to shake. And Aaron is fucking _done_  with playing nice and polite, you do not hurt his friends and you do not threaten them with deportation (or worse.) and also _fuck you how dare you_

so he gathers them all up in his car and doesn’t even mention when someone (Laurens) spills a drink on his upholstery and he refuses to answer questions for _hours_  and finally Alex, who’s been looking out the window and staying quiet, just snuggled up to a very intoxicated (and very warm) Hercules, Alex says “Holy shit – this is DC?”

and then, you know, Aaron throws a fucking shoe and when they bail him out of jail he is covered in kisses (sort of gross?? but v enthusiastic)


	8. the one with the selkie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which Alexander, fisherman, finds a selkie-skin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 12 January 2017.
> 
> unfinished & unedited. likely written on my phone -- that would explain the punctuation / capitalization idiosyncrasies.
> 
> just a sketch, really.

Alexander had never seen a selkie-skin before, but what else could it be? he wandered the coastline, water breaking around his feet and dragging back to itself, endlessly singing. at last he saw what he knew he'd find: dark eyes, in a slight natural cave.

she was nude. of course, but he hadn't thought of that. "come with me."

she didn't reply -- then"give me my skin!"

"oh -- is this yours?" softer than fur, light as moonlight, warm and damp.

"you know it is. gve it back."

"be my wife," he said. "for one year only. then i'll give it to you."

"lay with a human? i'd rather die."

"do that, if you like," he said easily; he wouldn't deny that he wanted her. helpless, a mess, pathetic -- and wild, wild. "but i'll not force you into my bed."

her eyes flashed like a tail might. "What then?"

"Sea-spirit, you must know the waves -- fishing, and currents -- weather -- come out to the water with me, make me wealthy for a year. And I'll set you free at the end of it."

"An unlikely ending," she said. "I cannot trust you."

"Trust or not, I dont much care; it's the only way to win your skin. Will you?"

"I will," she said: and emerged.

In the light her hair was softly silvery white, like a baby seal, and her eyes were green as kelp.

 

"I cannot do this human food," she said: so Alex taught her a passable meal, and after that he kept on cooking for the both of them, not much more work than for one, and she was nearly useless, always looking out the one dim window and pining for the sea. She took long walks alone there until he learned to join her and studied her face as she told him stories.

 

he could not touch her; her nails were sharp as claws and drew blood with teeth too.

but the first time she had a woman's blood, she wept, and then she let him hold her close.

 

kissing her was a revelation. she tasted of the sea and fish and darkness and waves, and chewed on his tongue until he gasped and pushed her away -- she looked, he thought, smug. "I was not going to hurt you!" he said.

"I do not want that," she said.

That hurt worse than her teeth. "You do, lass," he said -- and ducked as she threw at him whatever was nearest,  screaming epithets in a foreign tongue.

_Lass_ , he'd said.

Later she cried and was quiet and he lay down in the narrow bed as far from her as it would allow, wondering at her grief.

 

on the dark of the sixth moon, midnight, the ever-present winds calmed and Alexander jerked awake with the stillness. She breathed nearby.

"Did you hear that?" he said.

"I heard it."

He turned to her, wanting to say something -- what? -- to clean the constant grief from her voice -- he would have set her free ages ago if it had not wrapped him too in the bargain -- but she touched his bottom lip and then he pulled her closer and she was atop him, kissing, hungry, and so was he.  They ate of each other.

 

After that she was always laughing. 

Alexander forgot to measure the days, receding now from the great swell, more behind than before.


	9. the one that's a fanfic of a fanfic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which Burr fantasizes.
> 
> \-- this takes part during Chapter 12 of hologram's epic, practically-perfect-in-every-way slowburn, [A More Perfect Union](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7233154), and you should definitely be reading that, but it's completely good to stand alone if you haven't read it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 26 January 2017.
> 
> (i tried to write this in the style of the great holograms herself and failed, mostly.)

Burr wakes and for a moment he's not sure where he is -- at his home in New York? in Europe? His sleep-cloaked brain thinks it might even be a post in the Army, and for a second he is sick at the idea of the long future waiting on him. Fighting and killing, meeting and loving and losing Theodosia, battles in court and the Senate and with Hamilton, and then Weehawken and the slow grief of healing, his own and Alexander's and theirs together --

A soft noise from the other room focuses him enough to settle where he really is, and when, and who, and with whom.

And who he is _without_. This is Hamilton's house: and Hamilton is not nearby.

He left the bedcurtains open when he went to sleep; it was a beautiful night, windy and bright. Now the moon pours through the windows, making its own shadows. He could read a book in its light. He used to do that as a child, forbidden candles and flint; he'd stay awake hours and strain his eyes over the narrow rows of print, and everything he read seemed magical and significant, and went into his dreams, and stayed.

More noises. A laugh.

His body knows what is happening before he does, or at least before he can accept it; he shifts on the bed. Shuts his eyes.  _Dammit_.

And Eliza says: "Would you like me to wake Burr?"

and Alexander _groans_ (Burr hears him)

and it settles inside him, and he's already hardening and aching and touching himself. _Alex_ , he thinks. Has he ever done this before? No whores, no proxies, just himself and the painful honesty of desire. _Alexander, I want you._

Eliza is whimpering and Alex says something muffled and Burr moves faster (she is beautiful too) and while he's ashamed of thinking of her, using her in a way, it would be as much of a shame to pretend he doesn't want this.

He didn't want her, he _didn't_ , until he saw them together -- Alexander, thrusting inside while her eyes shut tight and she gripped his shoulder and god god god, Burr's toes clench around the image of them and the way he seems to be both or either, taker and consumed, --

"Alex," he says aloud: and then he can't help but moan and arch and come.

 

Sanity returns slowly to him, with a lingering sense of shame -- the prospect of shame -- the feeling he ought to be shamed. But he can hear the murmurs of a sated Hamilton and his wife, pleasured into sleepiness.

He thinks with a sort of incredulity that the Hamiltons have never denied him anything. Even Alexander responded when Burr kissed him; they gave him even that.

No: Alex kissed back. Remember that he kissed back.

Burr runs his fingers over his lips. Alexander kissed him there -- _right there_ ; Alexander sighed and opened his mouth and made the softest noise imaginable, and he didn't ever say _No_.

It's almost believable, in the moonlight.


	10. the one in which Alex is a hooker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> so the idea is that alex & john laurens, poor Whatevers, live together and can usually not make rent (something something street drugs? laurens is useless but pretty?)
> 
> laurens does not worry about this because he grew up in money and therefore is naive. alex grew up more or less homeless, in and out of foster care, sometimes living with an "uncle" who mysteriously paid the bills, in return for. 
> 
> alex is grown up and job hunting and he can't quite get his foot in the door, but he knows it's GOT to be him (he's the oldest and the wittiest), so he buys some clothes and crashes a few rich people house parties, the kind they give after college lets out so their bratty kids (cough Laurens cough) can hobnob with DC elite and get "internships"
> 
> etc
> 
> but. it is difficult to hide your roots; you show them in e v e r y t h i n g

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 4 January 2017.

 

*

  
Alone in the elevator, unable to look at himself in the mirrored walls, Alex stabbed the number button and shrugged off his suitjacket. But that was worse; his shirt wasn't good enough, wasn't the right fabric or weave or shade of white for all the fuck he knew. He put it back on. He was sweating. He knew it. He shouldn't be here. Shouldn't be doing this, again. It wasn't supposed to happen like this, he was supposed to be safe now -- but what was safe? How much money would make him safe? Unanswerable questions.

The last time was supposed to be the last time. He was a punk kid, he did what he'd had to do and considered himself lucky for finding his talents so young: a knack for friction and no gag reflex. If he did what he needed to do to get out off the streets, was that a sin?

He did what he needed to do.

And he was old enough now to have other options. He knew this routine, knew how to stand out from the ornate flower arrangements and the elegant people and the ridiculous clothes; he knew how to wear his off-the-rack suit like it cost three times what they did. He could merge into a group and become part of the banter, he could -- 

Until the conversation turned and the man next to him turned and sized him up without so much as a blink, and said "What was your first job," perfectly casual, perfectly disinterested, as only those born to wealth can be; he'd held on to his glass with three fingers. ( _Burr_ , that was his name. Heavy-lidded eyes like he was always sleepy or sarcastic, though his voice was neither; an absorbing focus, distracting in its intensity; the most beautiful hands Alex had ever seen. He was probably straight.) 

And Alex was gripping a wineglass by the stem. He needed to get rid of it but there were no convenient plants nor hovering servers with hor d'ouevres. His own fault for not considering the social context of alcohol choice. "First job? Ah. I worked with my hands."

"What -- like carpentry?"

"Something like that." Why the hell didn't he lie? He could have said he was a librarian or a candy striper or dug ditches or stuffed envelopes. Anything that didn't come near the truth. "Purely under the table. Paid absolutely nothing in taxes." These rich shits liked that.

"I bet you rose up quickly."

_The competition was stiff,_ he wanted to say, _but I handled it well._ He wanted to see how long he could make innuendo before Burr understood, but he wouldn't do it. Couldn't. Wouldn't. "I was ready for a new challenge."

Burr considered him. His hand cupped the bottom of the glass briefly, hiding the amber liquid; then he took a sip. "I would bet on you, Alexander," he said. "If I were a betting man."

"You've just met me."

"I'm a good judge of character." 

Dark eyes studied him, steady. "Are you on-site? I'm staying in room 816."

Alex thought of his worn-out food stamp card, left on the counter at home because he wasn't about to risk accidentally flashing its telltale shade of green in this group, these people he was trying to smooth-talk into a job and a paycheck. Just being in the room was most of the battle, he knew. Just being here -- but being here wouldn't count for shit if they were evicted next month. He forced a laugh. "Is that right? No, I didn't rent here this evening."

"Stop by later if you want to talk," said Burr. "I'll be awake. I never get much sleep."

 

 

He'd expected to hate it -- to slip out of himself with the old ease, still familiar although he hadn't used it in years. (He could do it at will, always, although he was not always able to stay when he wanted to do it.) 

He had expected Burr to be rough and grasping and painfully unaware of good practices and good manners; maybe he liked giving pain or receiving it, maybe he would swear or strike him, whatever, it was fine.

Instead there was slow dilation and a good brand of lubricant -- none of that drugstore shit -- and condoms tossed on the bed without Alex having to explain the risks of fluid transmission, and when Alex asked "Should I bottom?" he didn't have to explain what that meant. And he didn't seem to want much afterwards -- not cuddling or conversation, nor to push Alex out of the room and pretend it didn't happen. It was very strange.

 

"How did you know?" Alex said. "How did you know that I would -- that I've done this."  _How did you know I'd do it again,_  he wanted to say.  _How did you know what I didn't know._  
 "I didn't." A pause. "You just told me."  
 "But you asked me here."  
 "I placed a bet. How you responded was everything. Maybe you wouldn't understand, or pretend not to understand. Maybe you'd throw your drink in my face."  
 Alex remembered his own hesitation, his flushed cheeks, his acceptance that felt so slow and probably only looked like a second between offer and grasping. He hadn't meant to be so clear.   
 "Fuck," he said.  
 "You'll learn," said Burr.

 

Afterwards Alex got up and bent over to collect his clothes and felt a sudden welling of grief in him, like a sea-surge, his levees nothing at all against the depth; he must have made some noise because Burr rose up too and spoke gently to him and took him into the bathroom even, turning on the shower and letting him bathe in peace. 

And when he came out, there were his clothes -- neat and folded -- and a pile of cash on top -- and no Burr to be found, no need to force awkward conversation, nothing to do but go home.

 

He curled on to the couch next to Laurens. "I got rent. Worked some overtime."

And Laurens didn't object, didn't

even raise an eyebrow, so Alex didn't flinch when John tugged down his boxers, replacing the touch-memory with something different. ( _Burr_ , he thought as he came.)

 

_Burr_ , he entered into his phone, and saved the number as private.

 

The second time Burr said "Any rules?" before they started, surprising the hell out of Alex; he was surprised even more when Burr added "I ought to have asked you before. I apologize."

"No. None. Anything goes." It wasn't true, but it was true in the context of this situation. He had never said No to a hand offering cash.

Burr studied him.

He was more informal today, here at his own apartment, wearing what Alex thought might be his usual, as self-aware as if he bought it all from the "casual gentleman about town" section of a catalogue where they sold socks for seventy dollars a pair, on sale. Handmade by the noble farmers of wherever. But no: when you had that sort of money, you didn't risk papercuts. Or maybe you did. What did Alex know? He had on jeans from a church sale, cut off at the ankle to fit: he simply couldn't afford rent _and_ clothes _and_ metrocards _and_ the outfit it took to get him into parties.

 

 

After the third time Burr kissed him on the

mouth.

Alex kissed back with a certain level of formality and considered

meanwhile the likelihood that he was now on a watch list, since he was depositing large amounts of cash into the bank at regular intervals -- small bills only.

Burr had hesitated over it. "Is that good? I could give you a larger denomination, I suppose, but I thought --"

"That's fine." His cheeks burned.

"You're not acting like it's fine."

"I might need a bigger wallet, is all," he said, trying to make a joke of it, and Burr had smiled and Alex thought that was the end, that was enough, until the next week -- when a very nice money clip appeared, curved tight against the usual stack.

Alex felt those eyes on him, considering him; he knew he _needed_ to speak and he could not. 

The wallet was a gift from John.

 

Number seven eight nine ten blurred together into late afternoons and early nights and Burr kissing him so hard, so deliciously that Alex lost it entirely and kissed back, felt the hot throb of skin within his skin, heard Burr's gasp and his own whimper coming together, smelling and tasting the drip of sweat into his mouth from Burr's shoulder as he rocked back and forth, everything together making him feel far better than he should. 

He didn't deserve any of this.

  
What he deserved: the look on John's face when they make love, when John saw the marks Burr left. He deserved the screaming match to follow. 

It didn't happen. Laurens saw nothing smelled nothing suspected nothing, he was still cheerfully and kindly loving, and Alexander wanted to die.

But rent was paid.

 

The worst part was that he couldn't keep them separate. When he pressed into John, he thought _Burr_ \-- and shivered; and when Burr dragged his fingers over his hips and bit at the tender inside of his thighs, licking and tasting, Alex couldn't stop thinking of John Laurens. 

He couldn't stop wishing.

 

_(a guilty alex picks a fight with laurens, and then:)_

  
He slipped out from between the sheets and found a metro card on the table and came up out of the subway and smiled at the now-familiar doorman who let him inside -- and then he was face to face with a sleep-touseled Burr, who lost his expression of blinking confusion when Alex said "I can't sleep," and burst into tears.

Burr drew him a bath and undressed him slowly, letting Alex shiver on the thick white bath mat, letting him get cold and embarrassed before he let him step into the water: and then Burr was washing him gently, rubbing his skin, cupping his hands to pour water.

Alex lay his head back against the curved ridge of the clawfoot tub and looked at Aaron Burr.

He was barefoot, in striped cotton pyjama pants and a simple-looking t-shirt that probably cost more than Laurens brought home in a day from (whatever he does idek); he was still quiet, looking tired and thoughtful and far more human, more open, than Alex had ever seen him before. He'd thought a man was at his most honest in the moments before and after he came, but this ...

"What are you thinking?" said Burr.

Alex said: "That I don't know you at all."

Burr made a rough noise. "I assumed you didn't want to know me. You've done everything possible to ignore me, to treat me just as a body in your bed --"

"You're paying me to fuck you!"

"No," said Burr. "That's not what I am paying you for, at all."

Alex sat up; water sloshed over the rim. 

Burr didn't even flinch. His face was calm and reserved and Alex had no idea what he was thinking.

He was suddenly reminded of John Laurens -- and it took him a long moment to realize it was the pain in his gut. He'd fucked up. Again.

He didn't know how to fix it. He didn't know anything. He'd only ever had one thing to offer, and it had never been free.

"Burr," he said. No answer. He stood up and climbed out of the bath, awkwardly nude, and knelt, and took his face steady in his dripping hands, and kissed him.

He felt, bizarrely, that they'd never kissed before. Burr was shy; Alex coaxing. When he opened his mouth it was like light. When he tugged off Burr's shirt above his head, he felt he'd created a world.

_"_ I'm sorry," Burr kept saying. "I should have stopped it. I should have seen what I was doing to you. I should have, I should -- but Alex, Alex ..."

"I want to be inside you," said Alexander. He couldn't remember wanting anything so badly in his life; it wore him down to essentials. He didn't mean to speak so plainly and he thought he might blush tomorrow -- but today, tonight, he could only say I want you please let me.

And Burr let him.

Further further it wasn't _enough_ it wasn't -- and then he was in, and Burr hissed and arched, and Alex hesitated and waited and watched, aching, waiting until Burr shut his lips and opened his eyes, and then he went the rest of the way on a single stroke. Burr.

He wanted to touch him. He wanted to fall in love. He wanted to take him like this, hard and cruel, and leave him empty. "Burr," he said, helpless to make the decision. He'd misunderstood. Again. He'd thought that because Burr's hands were soft on the back of his head and because he was invariably polite and because he handed over the money openly, with his eyes dark and steady and unflinching -- he'd thought that he understood Burr. What had he missed? What else had he missed?

 His own hands, accepting the cash, folding it over, not counting it. Trusting Burr. Opening his mouth, shutting his eyes, not wanting to see that strange expression. He'd always been good on his knees; he'd always been good at dissolving his mind, letting his body be a hole to be filled. _What's your limit?_ Burr had said, and _Nothing_ , Alex had replied, meaning there was nothing he wouldn't do, nothing he hadn't done. Maybe he'd said more than he knew; maybe this was his limit. Finding nothing. Finding oblivion. If it was the best he had to offer, didn't that mean it was all he had?

 Burr hadn't tried to fill that; he saw it and accepted it and sat at the edge.

John didn't know it existed at all.

 Why hadn't he ever told John about this? A childhood on his knees. He'd been ashamed. He'd been heavy with it -- the weight of dark matter -- no. No. He _wasn't_ ashamed of doing what he needed to do, but John would expect him to be ashamed.

 And Burr had handed over the money with no flinching; he'd taken him to clean up; he'd asked what he was comfortable doing.

 If he had any sense, he would have fallen in love with Burr.

 Instead he pressed in hard one last time, speaking a name under his breath as Burr clenched down, coming almost simultaneously, bending down to kiss that perfect mouth afterwards. 

He knew now how Burr knew about John.

And Aaron Burr, who had never so much as implied the existence of another man in Alex's life, who was still shivering in the aftermath -- Burr said: "Is he as good as I am?"

"No," said Alex, honestly. And then, also honestly: "But I love him."

And he waited for Burr to flinch or yell or laugh. There was only a half-space of silence. "He doesn't love you. Anyone who loved you wouldn't let you be here."

"That's not true. You don't know shit."

"What will you do," said Burr, "if you're wrong?"


	11. the one in which they are superheroes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> addendum to the lovely [take a stand with the stamina god has granted us](http://archiveofourown.org/works/8893594).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written Dec. 2016.

They sat in the dark a long time that night. Burr was too angry to speak and Hamilton was, almost for the first time, afraid to hear what his more-or-less-committed-boyfriend was going to say. 

“Do you remember,” Burr said finally, “do you remember what I said to you when we started this thing?”

Hamilton swallowed. Burr wasn’t yelling; he sounded almost calm. That was a good sign, wasn’t it? This wouldn’t be so bad. “You told me to be careful. But you _know_  I heal –”

“That’s not what I said. What I said was, _Be smart._ ”

“I heal _so fast_.”

“You’re not invincible. You’re not bulletproof, Alex.”

“He missed me.”

For reply, Burr poked a finger in the long, narrow rent in Hamilton’s shirt and pulled it away from his body. “He got pretty damn close.”

“So? Herc will fix it up. He won’t even charge much.”

“You know I’m not upset about the tailoring bills.”

“Don’t be dramatic. You’ve come home with holes in your suit before–”

“Bullets won’t kill me!”

“I didn’t die either! Aaron. Stop. You can’t treat me like a child. We’re _equals_ in this, or haven’t you noticed? I have a gift! And, and you’ve said yourself that it’s a _responsibility_ , that it comes with–”

Burr folded his arms across his chest. “I was talking about myself. I have an obligation to help people. You have–”

“Bullshit. The same principles apply–”

“–fucking well _stay alive!_ ” Burr’s voice broke. 

Hamilton stopped mid-sentence, with his jaw open. He tried to speak and cleared his throat. “Aaron?”

Burr shook his head.

Hamilton sighed. “Look, I know you’re all … machismo and shit. I know you’re unaffected by silly little mortal things like _projectiles_ and _emotions_. But I’m gonna need you to repeat yourself here, because I didn’t quite catch it, and … and I want to know, okay.”

Burr took his time in answering this too. At last he said: “I need to know you’re coming home. Not ‘ending up in the hospital critically wounded but probably alive’, not going to get new clothes from Mulligan because your old ones were torn to shreds by … by whatever dangerous, foolhardy, _ridiculous_ stunt you pulled the night before. I need to know you’re going to be home at night, safe and whole and _alive._  Alex. I can’t deal with worrying about you.” He laughed a little; it sounded painful. “I thought I could deal with it, and then I spent a night not even being able to read a magazine, because I was in a waiting room and you were somewhere in surgery and maybe I’d never talk to you again, and the idea of losing you … Alex. I can’t tell you to stay home, I’d never tell you to do that, but–”

And it was his turn not to finish a sentence, because Hamilton pulled him down and kissed him, and the conversation was not finished in words.


	12. the one in which there is no self-control.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hamburr.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> posted 7 Dec 2016.

“Why did it take you so long?” (Alex is actually blushing.) “I didn’t think you were interested in me.”

“I wasn’t,” growls Burr, but it catches in his throat and changes to a laugh. “I have something that you’ll never experience.”

“Real-ly. And what might _that_ be? Because I think there can’t be much on you that I haven’t tried –”

Burr swats away the tickling fingers. “It’s called _self-control.”_

“Oh, that. Not interested. Thank you.”

Burr knows. And it fascinates him, this lack of interest; he aches to feel that way as much as he wants this to go on, this _whatever-it-is –_

 


	13. the one in which Alex is a slutty car-mechanic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which Burr writes the Reynolds Pamphlet.
> 
> based on holograms' Alex-The-Slutty-Car-Mechanic headcanon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written December 2016.

”Burr!”

It’s windy up here on the cliffs, and the night is dark as – as night, and the moon is hidden behind rolling clouds, lit up underneath by the lights of the city.  
Hamilton gets out this time and slams his car door and leans into the wind to shout again: “AARON BURR.”

The head turns towards him and a little orange flame flares and disappears.

He’s smoking again.

Of course he is. Feeling guilty, is he? The fucker. 

Alex goes over to him and Burr tilts back his head, looks down the bridge of his perfect nose, and Alex punches him in the face.

Burr staggers and steps away and swears, wiping at his nose (is he bleeding? Well. Good) and throws his cigarette over the side.

“You’ll light the place up! You know there’s a burn advisory.”

“Why the fuck are you here, Hamilton?”

“Why – you know why! You sent that picture to Eliza. What is wrong with you?

Burr doesn’t answer. He shoves his hands in his pockets and rocked on his feet.

The wind is getting colder; a storm is coming. "You selfish pig – you stupid poncy fucker – you shit. No one wants you, so you bring down everyone else? Is that it?”

“It’s amazing,” says Burr, “how you manage to justify your terrible behavior by blaming the consequences on me.”

“Nobody had to know! It wasn’t anything! It didn’t mean anything to anybody until you printed it and hung it out all over and sent it to my damn girlfriend.”

Burr shakes his head: “You’re pathetic. And I’m done with you. I’m going home.”

He gets in his car – he’s backed in carefully, and isn’t that typical, that he planned ahead for the moment he’d have to leave? It makes everything worse. Alex can’t pretend that Burr didn’t know what he was doing; he always thinks things though. He can’t pretend _anything,_  and he hates it. So he stomps over and jerks open the door. “Get out of there. We’re not finished.”

Burr actually laughs, and how DARE he? so Alex reaches in, meaning to take the keys out of the ignition and throw them over the damned side of the cliff and make Burr walk home, let him get rained on, let him get hypothermia and die, let him get washed away by a flash flood for all Alex cares – but he jerks back into the seat so violently that Alex starts and hits his head, and then he’s got his hands knotted in Alex’s shirt and he’s pulling him inside, on top of him, and all the anger and tension between them becomes suddenly, painfully clear.

There’s blood in his mouth. Burr’s mouth is bleeding and Alex is tasting his blood and he licks at it now, hungry for it. The front seat is long – a nice bench seat, they don’t make them like that nowadays but of course Burr drives some classic throwback that Alex has been hungry to get his hands on for MONTHS and now, – now he’s got his hands on a different knob. 

He was right to daydream. 

It’s a smooth ride.


	14. the one where Alex takes control

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 9 January 2017.

"I dont want you to speak."

"And here you're always telling me to talk m--"

Alexander puts his hand over Burr's mouth. "Quiet. As a matter of fact ..." And he glances around, finds only his own hastily-discarded tie marring the neat interior of Burr's living room. He picks it up. Silk. He can't easily afford to replace it. He shrugs. Stuffs it in Burr's mouth -- an uncomfortable fullness, and Burr gags a little before consciously relaxing.

It's a nice sight, and a familiar one: Alex feels himself stiffening.

As is Burr, he notices. So he reaches for it. Rubs.

Burr makes a noise.

"Something you want to talk about?"

Burr shakes his head.

"Should I tie your arms too? Or will you behave?" Impossible choices. He wants to force Burr spread open and helplessly keening, just as much as he wants his hands against him ... so. Compromise. Washington always told him to give a little to get a lot. "Just your arms?"

Burr makes a definite sound then -- but he doesn't spit out the necktie and he doesn't seem to be slipping out of himself into a place he can't reply, so --

 

(Alex ties Burr's arms.)

 

"Better." Not good enough. They're both clothed, more or less. Easily corrected. He's crawling on top of Burr in a moment, licking at his exposed hipbones, the slight trail of hair, nosing at his belly button, running fingers over fabric. "Mmm." He isn't teasing for Burr's benefit anymore, but his own -- he wants to see that c--k come free of its moorings, he wants to see it curve towards his mouth. He's already aching for it and he rubs himself, intentionally clumsy, murmuring "Aaron" and listening to the greedy whimper in return.

Button, zipper, and -- "You really were eager," because it's just skin below those pants.

Alex has to clear his throat.

Steady, boy.

He pulls them down over that fucking beautiful ass, so perfect he can't even look at it yet, he has to focus or he'll be distracted, and right now he just wants to kneel between those spread legs and bite a path up the thighs -- one and then the other, licking and nibbling betimes, tucking his hair back because it keeps falling down and that's got to tickle -- yes, Burr gives a great twitch and shiver all over and Alex sees he's already wet and he gives in. He wants to do it, anyway, and Burr is being so good, he is always so good for it, he'a always ...

So Alex licks a little and shuts his eyes and does not quite take it in his mouth. Not yet. "Not yet," he says to the prone figure, moaning now quite openly -- god he is good he is so good and Alex moans too, listening, encircling himself, arching back, shivering upright. "Ahh. Okay. But you can't come yet."

Burr says one of his favorite phrases, familiar even through the gag.

In retaliation, Alex gets up. "Oh, dear." He wiggles out of his clothes -- at least he, for one, wore underpants. "And here I was going to bring you off with my fingers inside you. But that was rude, Aaron Burr, and you know it. Rude boys don't get rewarded."

Burr shuts his eyes and moans -- in annoyance or desire or both, it's impossible to tell. And fuck constancy, fuck conditioning and orgasm denial and refractory periods, if Alex doesn't get his mouth around that c--k he is going to embarrass himself.

So he crawls back on the bed and only bites one last time, at the base of Burr's p---k, before he takes a deep breath and sinks down to the hair.


	15. the one in which there four seasons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hamburr "seasons" prompt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 27 October 2016.

Winter. The days are quick and cold; everything is clear; everyone is back-lit by candles, pink-cheeked with alcohol and laughter. “What’re you trying to hide, Burr?” says Laurens, pressing into him. He is damned pretty and his mouth looks sweet – and Burr might be able to like him, except they only meet around Hamilton, circling his gravity like planets competing for a place in the sky.

_What’re you trying to hide?_

He tries to hide the truth inside a quick explanation about Theodosia and ducks out again, missing how a drunk Alexander stands up, calling out to him, wanting him to stay, but he is gone.

The sunlight is so brief, the days pass so quickly. He cannot get them back. He cannot make a change. What happened in the ballroom is already memory, already gone; what happened between him and Alex lies further back than that.

 

  
Springtime in the country creeps on gradually; the flowers hesitate under the earth, they wait for surety, and Burr waits with them. He doesn’t know what he’s waiting for – he doesn’t know what would be enough – he only knows the thought of Hamilton frightens him. Alexander is all dark eyes and hot impatience, and it wakens something in his belly that he doesn’t want to address.

– until they are walking alone, far outside the campsite, and Hamilton bumps into him. The first time might have been an accident; the second seems deliberate, though neither acknowledges it; the third time Alexander pushes him down into the grass that is barely tall enough yet to hide their bodies.

The time goes too slow and then too fast. 

_Wait_ , he wants to say to the afternoon, to Alex’s hands on him, to his own unsteady heart. _Wait. Hold still._ _Don’t go._ But there’s no holding it back. When Burr raises his head, mouth swollen from Alex’s mouth, all the sky is rose and gold, and all the trees are out in noisy, blossoming joy.

 

  
“I can’t do this,” says Hamilton, buttoning up after doing it. “You’re a liability.” There is tension in his voice, and Burr recognizes it: Alex does not believe this but wants to believe it, and he will act on a hope as if it is the truth.

So Burr looks out the window. It’s the end of the summer; the light is golden and rose in the sky, mingling with woodsmoke. The trees themselves look ablaze. “I’ve always considered you a friend,” he says, to the trees.

It isn’t true. They’ve never been friends. Whatever they have – _had_ – was never so simple as that.

He tries to find something to say – something cutting, something perfect, something that will make it through Alexander’s goddamned selfish pride and convince him that politics are not always the most important thing.

He doesn’t speak. He can feel the distance between them already; he already knows how the stars look, how they show not the light that is but the light that was.

 

  
Time is too slow in summer; it drags down the skin like sweat. 

On the long boat-ride over the Hudson, in the sticky steamy morning, Burr decides he will do it after all, he will shoot – and he will lose. He knows that. He will gamble on his own terrible luck and Alexander’s perpetual winnings against the house.

They have so much time to watch each other across the field; they have so much time to apologize and so much time to decide against apologies. Still it takes Burr a long time to raise his arm. (How long did they have together? As long as that, and more.)

Blood stretches over Hamilton’s shirt slow and cruel, and Burr has thirty-two years to watch the bloom unfold.

 


	16. the one with prom night

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hamburr PROM.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 30 October 2016.

This, Alex thought, was surprisingly boring.

He shouldn’t have been surprised; these were the same kids he went to school with, after all, just dressed up in long dresses and sport coats – and this was just the gymnasium covered in tinsel and the quick bright flashes of light from a half-dozen disco balls – but he’d fallen in love with the idea of prom somewhere along the way, and he’d made up an elaborate rap and stood on a lunchtable to impress Angelica into agreeing to be his date, and then there were all the photographs and the feel of her hand in his and trying to be polite to her father and to her little sisters crowding around, – 

But now she was gone off to the bathroom – again – and he was left with a bitter taste in his mouth.

She’d been gone fifteen minutes.

Everyone else was having fun.

He slouched down in his chair a little further.

Everyone else was dancing – no slow-dancing, that was embarrassing, they were grinding and giggling and flirting.

And he was stuck here with Aaron Burr – the other smartest kid in the class, his silent rival in a game neither one would admit they were playing. Aaron Burr, also ditched by his date.

Not that Alex had been ditched.

Alex kicked the heel of one shoe against the other, trying not to be pissed off.  
And then Burr said something frankly unbelievable, and – 

“What? What did you say?”

“I said we should go dance, Hamilton.” A pause. “You do dance, right?”

“Like a drunk Chita Rivera,” said Alex.

“What?”

“Nothing. I don’t want to dance.” Not with you, he almost said, but that would be rude, and something about Burr always made him want to fix his clothes and mind his pronunciation. 

“Come on – why not? Our dates dumped us, so –”

“Angie did not dump me!”

“Either she and Maria have spent the last thirty minutes fixing their makeup, or they left. Does it matter? Sulking doesn’t look good on a pretty face –”

So Alex was startled into compliance, and found himself in the midst of all his classmates, all looking suddenly taller and older in their finery.

And Burr was still holding on to his wrist – right until he saw Alex glance down at their skin, touching. “Stop thinking,” he said, in a voice that strained over the noise. “Dance, Hamilton.”

And Alex let himself dissolve into the music and the smell of sweat and nerves and the feeling of bodies against his, no matter if they were schoolmates, they didn’t look like it tonight, not really – tonight they were something else –  
– and the music changed and the lights dimmed and all around. Burr didn’t move – a static center to the room. He looked ready to leave. 

Alex didn’t want him to leave. 

He reached out. “Are you afraid of me?”

“No. Of course not. What?”

“So trust me,” said Alex, and pulled him a little closer and a little closer and a little bit more, and now he was in his arms, not quite in a gay way (was it?) but still they were quite close, weren’t they? Him and Aaron Burr.

Burr had his eyes closed and Alex forgot how to shift around in a fake box step; he was watching the shards of light pass over the planes and valleys of his face, and feeling Burr’s hand warm and low on his back, and wondering how the hell he ever got himself into these situations – and how he’d get out.

He shut his eyes, not meaning to do it. 

When he opened them again, Burr was staring at him. His hand moved up to cradle the back of Alex’s head, lightly.

“Fuck it,” said Alex, and he lifted up on his tip-toes for a kiss.

When he moved away, Burr’s eyes were very wide. “Are you serious?”

Alex couldn’t let go of his arm. “Do you want me to be serious?”

He shifted forward again, dragging Burr down to meet him, biting at his mouth until it parted and he gasped, laughing. “You don’t waste time.”

“There’s never enough of it.” Alex studied him. “Let’s go home. Now. You and me.”

“You’re kidding.”

So Alex kissed him again, until some of the other kids started yelling, and 

“Yes – yes – let’s go –”


	17. the one with soldiers and nightmares

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hamburr, with soldiers and nightmares.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 31 Oct 2016.

One of them ought to stay awake and keep watch but they are tired and irritable with the day and each other and it doesn’t seem important really, Burr just shrugs it off, and Alex is still feeling touchy from the long walk and how goddamned wrong Burr is about every goddamned thing, and if he opens his mouth to speak he’s going to say all of that and more, so he doesn’t say anything at all; he just lies down in the wet leaves and shuts his eyes and prays he’ll sleep soon.

He does.

– and something wakes him. 

Not something. Some _one_. 

He’s sitting up and sweating and his hand’s on his musket before before he is awake enough to realize the sound is coming from beside him but it’s impossible  _Burr_ is making that noise –

– but there he is curled up, legs drawn to his chest, one hand in a tight fist and one outstretched towards nothing, and bits of leaves are clinging to his uniform and his skin, and he’s dreaming, he is still dreaming, and Alex has no idea what to do.

“No _,_ ” Burr says. “Please?“

Alex hates Burr – but he thinks of his own bad dreams, thinks he wouldn’t be grateful to have another man witness them, thinks he should wake him, maybe.  
So he reaches out to his shoulder and gives a shake. The wool beneath his hands is rough and damp and smells like unwashed soldier, a smell that’s never gotten contemptuous through familiarity. 

Alex reminds himself again that he hates this man. 

He shoves him. "Wake up, sir –

A gasp and a jolt and Burr is awake, sitting up, face turned a sickly gray. "What is it?”

“Nothing,” says Alex, wishing now he hadn’t acted. “Nothing, sir. You were dreaming.”

Burr stares at him.

Alex tries not to talk, fails, says again: “It was a dream. A bad dream.”

And Burr bursts into tears. 

He covers his face a second too late, standing up and turning away – but it’s obvious anyway, he hasn’t hidden anything at all – and it’s obvious he doesn’t want Alex to do anything – and Alex can only faintly remember just why and how much he hates this man before he goes over and tugs at his arms and pulls him against his own body, saying nonsense, letting his head drop against his shoulder and cradling the back of it like Burr is fragile as a new egg, saying his name.

They end up on the forest floor again, knee-to-knee, with Alex rubbing and petting Burr’s hand and telling him over and over “I know” to the disjointed, incomprehensible dream-story Burr is telling, he’s wiping at his face with the hand Alex isn’t holding, his nose is running, he’s a fucking mess, and he’s so goddamned beautiful that Alex puts a hand on his cheek – he can’t help himself – and when Burr stops mid-sentence, pupils wide and eyes clear, Alex shifts over and kisses him on the mouth.

He only realizes it after he does it and then he just stays a moment longer, and then longer, and finally pulls away with regret.

“Alexander?” says Burr on an upward note and an inward breath. "Alex – _“_


	18. the one with metaphor and no sense

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hamburr, with pain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 5 Nov 2016.

Alex isn’t a forest; he isn’t an open field. He’s a marsh, with rotten spots that catch at Burr’s feet, and if he misses a step he might be dragged down. So Burr turns away.

Then there is a time when Alex takes him harsh and rough, and Burr shuts his eyes – he always does, he likes to feel he is in the dark, to think they’re both there together, no matter the sunlight that falls in streaks across the forest floor, no matter the heat of the day on his skin –


	19. the one in which Burr is a sock-knitter.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hamburr, and knitting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 5 Nov 2016.

"You knit?”

Burr ignored this incredulity.

“You _knit_ ,” Alex said, in a different voice.

“I like having something to do with my hands.”

“You’re not a fidgety sort of person.”

Burr ignored this, too; he was counting.

“What are you making?”

“Socks.”

“Are they for me?”

“They are not.”

“My feet get _cold_ , Burr.”

“Still not for you, Hamilton.”


	20. the one in which Alex deserves a much lower grade than he received

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tiny hamburr, modern university Au.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 5 Nov 2016.

B-minus? Unbe- _fucking_ -lievable. 

Alexander slumped down in his seat and waited – not his best quality – and when class was over he took his stuff and jogged down the steps, paper in hand, and slammed the paper on the table at the front of the room. “Hey.”

The TA didn’t bother to look up. 

Alex narrowed his eyes. He was … nondescript. Almost deliberately so. Tall-ish, closely trimmed hair, button down and khakis – the most individual thing about him was the rather nice pen he tucked into the leather messenger bag.

Alex shifted his weight. “Um. Hello?”

“I heard you the first time.” Dark brown eyes; a disarming coolness in them. “What is it?”

“It’s about my paper.” Holding it out: “You gave me a B.”

“Barely.”

“I deserve better. I _deserve_  an A.”

“You _deserve_ ,” said Burr, “even worse than the grade I gave you. I was feeling generous last night …”


	21. the one in which Burr honestly does not give a fuck

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tiny hamburr.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 5 Nov 2016.

“Hey. Time to wake up.”

“Mmm.”

“It’s six fifteen.”

“But you’re so _warm_.”

“Alexander. Up. Now.”

“Don’t tell me what to do.” But he shifted and rubbed his eyes. “Is it really that late? You’re not fucking with me?”

“Six-seventeen, now.”

“Fuck. I’m going to be late.” He fell out of the bed with habitual grace and squinted at the floor. Pants. Shirt. Okay. “Where are my socks? I can’t find my socks. Can I borrow yours?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Please? I’m going to be late –” Wide eyes.

“No.”

“ _Fuck_ ,” said Hamilton, and ran out the door in bare feet, shirt in hand.


	22. the one with cookies, and Lams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sad Alex gets a little Laurens love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 18 November 2016.

“Alex?”

He hears the voice. Recognizes it. Laurens. He loves Laurens.

He tries to emerge.

Fails.

“You in here? … Under the pile of blankets, I see.” The bed shifts under his weight. “A bad day? Hey?”

The worst.

He doesn’t move.

Smooth, slow strokes move over the blanket, starting near his shoulders. “Can I get you something?”

Alex shakes his head. Reconsiders. “Whiskey.”

“No alcohol when you’re sad. You know that. It’s bad. What else? Wanna order food?”

No.

“Okay. How about something else to drink. Milk, you think?”

No. Definitely not.

“Tea?”

Maybe tea.

The weight shifts again; he kisses Alex’s ear, where it’s exposed a little. “I’ll start the water.”

Alex peeks out. “Cookies?”

A snort.

That means yes.


	23. the one in which Alex sees his ex and needs to piss him off

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 27 January 2017.

He was mad. He had to be. He’d gone mad when he saw Jefferson across the room. He was wearing those goddamn leather pants, he was clearly on the prowl, and Burr could not handle it – not again – not tonight – he’d wanted to drink and maybe dance, if he drank enough, and maybe go home with someone. 

He’d wanted to make a mistake.

But now Thomas was here, and he was thinking that maybe his whole goddamned life was a mistake. He ordered another drink, and said “That’s my ex,” by way of explanation.

“Who?” said a short, pretty boy near by.

Burr hadn’t been talking to him – he hadn’t been talking to anyone in particular – he’d only spoken to let out some of the aching grief in his chest. But what did it matter? What did anything matter? “Tall, dark skin, lovely foof of hair.” Leather pants. Ripped shirt. Arms like a Greek god.

“The one packing it?”

“Ah. Yeah. That’d be him.” Burr downed half of his fresh drink: he would never again taste what Thom packed. Pity.

“He’s looking at you.”

“Great.” Burr finished the rest of the glass and put it on the bar. “Another, please.”

“He’s coming over here.”

“Hide me,” said Burr. It was a joke: he was taller than the guy next to him by half a head.

“I’ll do you one even better.”

– and it was on the tip of Burr’s tongue to ask what _even better_ meant in this context – but then he was being kissed, and so goddamn nicely that he was kissing back, and when he felt a pair of hands wrap around his waist and pull him nearer he didn’t fight it in the least, and he didn’t fight it when the guy bit his bottom lip and licked at him, and when the hand dropped low and curved around his ass, he didn’t fight it at all – he just returned it all, touch for touch, and when he realized he was grinding a little (and that he was drunk quite a lot), he made himself let go. Step back. _Apologize_. “Sorry.”

“For what?" 

– that mouth was swollen. Burr couldn’t stop looking at it. He couldn’t stop thinking about the feel (the shape the size) of – "I shouldn’t have kissed you like that. Um. But thanks, I guess.” He tried to laugh; it came out a little shaky.

“Is he still looking?”

“I made it up, man. He didn’t even glance over here. I don’t think he saw you at all.” Pause. “Does that make you like me more? or less?”

Burr’s hands were sweat; he wrapped them around his new drink. “Depends. Did that kiss make you like me more – or less?”

“The kiss was okay.”

Just _okay_ , huh.

“– what I really liked,” and he touched Burr’s hip, pressing his thumb heavy over the fabric of waistband and dragging his hand down lower so Burr made a rough noise in his throat – “what I liked, was this. – And now you’re not saying anything, and you’re thinking I’m assaulting you, and you’re thinking I’m horrible, and I’ll just leave –”

“No. I was thinking,” (it took him a second to collect his breath) “I was thinking maybe we could find something else to your liking.”


	24. the one that's a RENT au (part 1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a ridiculous Rent/Hamilton crossover AU between pinkconsultingsociopath & myself -- The Tango Alex.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 10 Nov 2016.

He’d always assumed recording spaces would be large and cavernous, or at least empty, in some post-modern sort of way – but this was a mess.  _And_ it was dirty. 

Burr scuffed his shoe against the linoleum floor. It squeaked. 

Laurens looked up. 

He was on the floor and covered in dust and he looked like he was summoning patience with Alexander, Burr, recording studios, recalcitrant wires, and the world at large.

Burr felt guilty over nothing. He scowled. “I shouldn’t even _be_ here.”

“You are more than welcome to leave. Hand me that transaxle cable before you go, will you?”

“The – the what?”

“The red one, Aaron.”

He hated being called Aaron and he was pretty sure that John Laurens knew he hated being called Aaron. So that’s where they were? He kicked the cable over, rather than picking it up and handing it politely, and made a face at himself. “I don’t know even why we’re _doing_ this. Nevermind, I certainly don’t care about your reasons; why am _I_ doing it?”

“Because Alex asked you to do it,” said John, head under the desk now and voice muffled.

“ _Because_ _Alexander said so_ is a shitty reason to do anything.”

“Grouchy today, are we? Here, try the mic. Say something. Anything.”

He shut his eyes, feeling foolish. “Test one-two-three.” Ugh, the sound of his own voice over the speakers made him flinch – and not only because of the feedback. Was that really how he sounded?

“Anything but that.” But Laurens was smiling – of course, he dropped it as soon as Burr caught him at it.

“This is weird.”

“Very weird.”

“Fucking weird.” He was twitchy. He stepped away from the mic and away from Laurens, who had apparently fixed the wires to his satisfaction but was nevertheless still staring into their tangle like he didn’t know what else to do with his eyes. “I’m so mad that I don’t know what to do. What is wrong with me? Is this my life now? Fighting with microphones, freezing down to my bones – you might have warned me this place has no _heat._ ”

“I’m not your mother, you know? And it is January; you could try wearing a coat. What, don’t you have any to matches your outfit?”

Petty bastard. “And to top it all off, I’m with you. Where the fuck is Alexander? He’s an hour late.”

John smiled. “Feel like going insane? Got a fire in your brain? And you’re thinking of drinking gasoline?”

“As a matter of fact –”

“Honey, I know this act. It’s called the ‘The Tango Alexander.’”

“That’s a _terrible_ rhyme scheme.”

“Look, I didn’t name the guy.” Laurens shut his eyes and intoned: “Ze Tango Alexander! It’s a dark, dizzy merry-go-round. As he keeps you, ah, _dangling_ –” He grinned. 

Burr felt hot. “You’re wrong.”

“Your heart, he is mangling –”

“It’s different with _me_. Us. It’s different with _us_. Don’t come here and act like you know me –”

“You’re the one who came to me, Aaron Burr. Shall I go on? – You toss and you turn, 'cause his dark eyes can burn, yet you yearn and you churn and rebound –”

Fuck. Okay. That one hit too close to home. He sat on the edge of the step and rubbed his chin. “I think I know what you mean.” Trying to laugh: “Has he ever pouted his lips and called you 'Pookie’?”

Laurens sat down next to him, not too close. “Have you ever doubted a kiss or two?”

Spooky – but he shook his head, he wouldn’t give Laurens the satisfaction of admitting … except … “Did you swoon when he walked through the door?”

“Every time – so be cautious.”

Burr edged away from that warmth. “Did he moon over other boys?”

“He did plenty more than _moon_.”

“I’m getting nauseous." 

Laurens laughed. "Come on. Stand up.”

“What?”

“Stand up. Do you know how to dance?”

“Leave me be,” Burr told him, darkly. Still he felt those warm hands on his shoulder – and he sighed – and stood, and faced his enemy –

And light came in from the window, diffused by the long hazy curtains Burr had bought from a thrift store and hung there weeks ago to block out prying eyes, the curtains Alex was constantly eyeing and fussing at like he wanted to tear them down. 

Anything nice made Alexander twitchy.

Meanwhile, John Laurens was tall and calmly amused and his hair was nicely groomed and his shirtsleeves were pushed to the elbows and his wrists (Burr couldn’t help but notice) were … they were nice. Very nice.

He wasn’t electric; he didn’t burn and sparkle. But he knew how to dance.

So. Okay. One arm around his waist – John’s mouth quirked – and one in the air. “Who leads?”

“Shush,” said Laurens. “One, two …”

It took them a few tries. Burr found himself laughing aloud. “It’s hard to do this backwards.”

"You should try it in heels.”

“You’re not serious? Are you serious?”

“Hey, chill out Aaron. If that’s not your thing, it’s not your thing …”

Burr muttered under his breath and John Laurens stopped: “Are you mad?”

“I’m counting.”

“So. Not mad.”

“Not at you.” God, he smelled nice. Burr cleared his throat. “He cheated.”

“He cheated on me with you,” said Laurens, perfectly polite. “But let’s not talk about that.”

Burr stopped mid-step – he wasn’t losing much, neither one of them was a great dancer anyway. “I’m defeated. I should give up. He’s never going to get better. He’s going to stay beautiful and horrible.”

“Shh. Come on.”

So they sat again, closer this time.

“He cheated,” said Burr again.

Laurens took his hand, and Burr let him. “Look on the bright side. You’re free from him now.”

“If he came by and batted his goddamn eyes, I’d fall for him again anyway,” said Burr, bitter as coffee: and John kissed him.

His mouth was startling – warm and broad and perfectly firm, perfectly yielding – and Burr kissed him back.

When they were through, John studied him. “You okay?”

“I’m fine. Just. This is –”

“Yeah, well. I couldn’t help myself.” He grinned. “I didn’t try real hard.”

“Might as well dance a tango to hell.”

“Exactly.”

They were still holding hands. Burr couldn’t quite bring himself to move away. He ought to do it, but … “Why do we love when he’s mean?”

“Burr …”

“And he can be so obscene.”

“Why does it not surprise me that you’re vanilla?”

“Darling, there is so much you don’t know about me yet.”


	25. the one that's a RENT au (part 2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> continuation of the RENT au

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 10 December 2016.

Alex leaned in. Closer. Kissed Burr. _God_ he was good at that. Burr was shifting closer before he knew it, putting pressure on the kiss, straining into Alexander, licking at his mouth to open it, god he shouldn’t _react_ like this, why was he so _unhealthy_ –

He pulled away, breath unsteady. Buried his face in that hair. Stupid hair. Stupid boyfriend. _Stupid me_ , thought Burr faintly, but he went ahead anyway. “I kissed Laurens.”

No reaction.

“On the mouth,” because maybe that was relevant? “Also, um, it was more than once. Several times.” He could have said more. He could have said _Now I understand what you see in him, or he tastes like burnt sugar,_ or _I want to see where his freckles ended, Alex, and I think he would be okay with that._

“Are you breaking up with me?”

Burr stared at his face. Unbelievable. “We already broke up. You cheated on me.”

“You’re in my lap,” Alexander pointed out: he smiled. “You’re _happy_ to be in my lap.”

When had _that_ happened? Burr scowled. “Look.”

“I said I was sorry. Don’t you believe me?” His hand dropped to his – their – lap and began to gently scratch at the fabric there.

“Alexander,” said Burr.

“You don’t want to break it off with me, do you?”

“Uhh –”

“And you don’t want to keep on with Laurens.”

“You only want me back because I was with him.” God, did that mean Alex was fucking Laurens again, too? Burr couldn’t bear to think it. 

Maybe they should make a big tent fort and live there together, like puppies.

It might be worth sharing Alex to taste John Laurens again.


	26. the reincarnation au

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a very brief non-finished reincarnation AU.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 21(?) January 2017.

This is how it is:

Aaron is a hospice nurse. He wears a simple uniform, flat shoes that do not squeak on the tile floors, a watch with a sweeping second hand. His hands are cool.

Alexander is dying in the seventeenth bed in the left.

He drifts in and out of consciousness, he's dizzy even lying down from the medication and the lights and the noise, he says, although the place is usually quiet, except the beep of machines and the rhythm of Aaron's shoes, scuffling.

He says: I hurt.

Aaron touches his wrist. He counts the beats. It's in time with the machines, of course it is, but it calms both of them.

Aaron says: I know.

Alexander says: Help me.

Aaron sits on his hospital bed. He covers Alexander's hand with his own. At last he says: I'll try.

He brushes back the hair over Alexander's face and checks the cables and checks the time and starts to say something and decides against it and leaves the room, goes down the hallway. Gets what he needs.

Alexander is already dead when Aaron gets back to the room.

 


	27. the one in which there is a rented bed and a happy ending.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex can't sleep for looking at Aaron.
> 
> (Aaron has no problems sleeping.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 10 March 2017.

Alex can't sleep. Partly it's sickness from being back on land -- a curious stomach ailment he prefers to ignore, as it brings up memories of being similarly ill in a ship's hold, and fire, and a hurricane, and four storms, -- and worst of all he remembers the sound of muffled tears in a borrowed coat-jacket. Crying alone in his berth the day he left Nevis. He'd never come back, he swore, like a man would swear it: and underneath he could not stop thinking _I won't ever be able to come back._

He's mostly eschewed ships since then, as any sensible man would. 

But Burr can hardly be accused of being sensible.

Isn't that what Alex has always loved in him ( _admired,_ he thinks: I meant to think  _admired_ ) -- All that flare and passion, and he keeps it so quiet. No one would even suspect it was there. Hell, _Alex_ isn't always sure it’s there.

 _I hadn't really meant all that, back then,_ he wants to say _. I was drunk and stupid. You didn't need to shoot me over it._

Although maybe the duel was worth while. It brought them to this. _It brought me to you._

It bought them a rented bed and a decent traveler's inn -- Burr is never one for ostentation but neither does he suffer privation gladly. It brought Alex here, skin to skin in the night time, waiting for Burr to wake from his heavy first sleep so Alex can lean over, and kiss him, and tell him again in no uncertain terms what a momentous pain in in the ass _lunatic_ he is ...

... Alex has almost decided on the exact right words to use when he falls asleep ... and he tugs one arm around Burr's hip to bring him nearer. 

Even in sleep, Burr complies. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i do sometimes do shit on tumblr  
> @ littledeconstruction  
> sometimes i ignore it tho


	28. in which we live in a dark dark wood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> anon prompt from "a softer world" comics --
> 
> "in a dark dark wood there was a dark dark house and in that dark dark house I think we should get drunk and fool around (I want dirt under my fingernails)"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 15 March 2017 -- the Ides.

In a dark dark wood there was a dark dark house and in that dark dark house lived a dark dark man

 

And one night a traveler knocked on his door.

The house was far from any road, and the man was unaccustomed to company; but neither was he afraid. He accepted the stranger into the room, saying he would give him both food and shelter, as the night had turned to wind and rain and the traveler was soaked through to the skin, and shivering.

They ate commonplace things: brown bread without butter and fish from the near river, and between them they drank a good quantity of wine. Over and over their cups refilled and emptied with laughter and toasts -- to the wine itself, to the beauty of the forest in a storm, to themselves and to each other. As the night wore on conversation grew quieter and the laughter, when it came, was louder.

Long after midnight they finished. The traveler trailed behind his companion walking up the steps; he admired the many deep carvings along the woodwork, and the oil paintings that hung just out of sight.  
"The bed is large enough for two," said the dark man, and he was right, but they lay so tangled, each to each, that the size of bed did not matter.

At last the rain stilled to a murmur. The traveler shut his eyes and smiled: his head rested on the other's arm like it was a feather pillow, and his breath came slow and easy. In the light of a candle he was as beautiful as anyone, as anything: and that was the decision made. The dark man took out his knife and pulled it across the throat held up so openly, trustingly, he thought this was nothing more than a continuation of what the storm and the wine and the bedsheets had began: this was their dance.  
Then he closed his eyes and slept, too.

 

In the morning the rain was over and the ground was soft; he dug at it a few strokes with a shovel but it made a distance between them and he could not bear it; he knelt down and added dirt to the blood beneath his fingernails.

It was hard work, physical work, and he had done it before. He knew to pace himself; he knew when to press forward through the ache and when to sit back for it to pass. So he tired and rested and began again, watched meanwhile with unblinking eyes by the sightless traveler now curled on his side, wine in his stomach, empty hands twisted upward on the ground as if he still tried to reach the sky


	29. the one in which all's fair in love and smut

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex (that manipulator!) gets manipulated in turn.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 20 March 2017, for a fruit who needed distraction

Burr wasn't stupid (he thought). He considered himself pretty intelligent. He was at least as smart as Hamilton, maybe more.

It still took him three months to figure out his boyfriend's scheme.

And then he waited.

It was not long in coming.

He was tapping his pencil against his book, reading, thinking, and Alex took it out of his hand and broke it in two and threw it across the room. "If you can't stay still," he said, with a few extra swears added in.

Burr blinked at him, placid as a cow. "Why, Hamiltn. I didn't realized that bothered you. I'm dreadfully sorry." And he started reading again, eyes trained on the page, mouth a careful line.

"Don't call me that! You sound like -- like a guidance counselor."

"Mm," said Burr. "Well. I'm sorry for that, too. Alexander. Darling."

Alex gawped. "What the fuck?"

"What do you mean?"

"Burr -- er. Aaron, I mean. What is wrong with you?"

Burr counted to five but he still wanted to punch Alex, so he counted to ten before he said "Please don't call me that."

Slowly, Alex smiled. "Sorry -- Aaron."

"That is IT." Burr slammed his hand on the table and got up and came towards his boyfriend. "You're a shit, Hamilton --"

Alex backed up, hands out, but he was smiling too. "Oh, is it that again --"

Burr actually growled at him; he stopped a few inches away and used his slight (very slight) height advantage to full effect. "Don't fuck with me. How long have you been doing this?"

Alex shook his head, all innocence. It was a front; he never looked innocent except when he was lying. "Doing what?"

"Picking a fight so we can make up. You're a shit. You're a useless fuckhead. I can't believed you'd do this. Manipulate me like that."

"Burr. I didn't -- I'm sorry. Are you really mad? Tell me you're not really mad."

"I am furious, and you know it. Did you think I wouldn't notice? Did you think i'm too stupid?"

"It did take you months," started Alex, who was in fact looking slightly guilty -- but when Burr turned away,he chased after him. "Hey. Stop. Wait. Hey, don't go ..."

And he was reaching up to put his arms around Burr's neck, holding him in place while he kissed slow and deep, dropping one hand down to curl around Burr's hip and arch himself closer. "Don't go."

Burr said: "And now you think you can grind on me and make up for it? Typical." But he held still while Alex rubbed harder, a well-known rhythm in the movement, press and withdraw. And then Alex caught his breath, tho he had done nothing yet but use Burr as a scratching-post, and Burr's eyes drooped heavy.

"Don't leave," again, in a different tone. "I am sorry. I'm awful. I'm the worst. Burr, tell me how bad I am. Make me suffer." He was pressing Burr's hand over his own cock now, rutting a little. "Burr. Please."

"You deserve to suffer." Was that his own voice -- heavy like that? Jesus. He cleared his throat. "You deserve to be alone. All alone. Forever. Never getting off again." But Alex was nearly hard now, he could feel it, hear him whimpering a little; he knew that languid expression -- damn the man! Burr shifted forward, couldn't help it. "You deserve to be unloved."

"Burr," said Alex, or rather moaned. "Do you hate me now?" And he put his hand on Burr -- they were touching each other -- and (traitorous cock) it jumped under that warm palm.

And Alex worked down Burr's zipper and inched in his fingers to a space grown too small for comfort, and now it was Burr's turn to whimper.

"Yes -- yes, I like that -- let me --" and Alex went to his knees and oh jesus he was beautiful, taking out his hair tie and spitting in his hand and licking around the tip of Burr like he wanted to clean it off before he put it in his mouth, which was ridiculously fastidious behavior, Burr at least showered daily while Hamilton had been known to go a week without --

Oh Jesus. Oh sweet god. Where a man got a mouth like that, he did not know, unless he was in fact descended from whores, which didn't bother Burr so much as it should because at least Alex was finally, finally putting his talents to good use --

He gripped Alex by the back of the head, tangling his fingers in his hair. He wouldn't push forward -- wouldn't wouldn't wouldn't --

He pushed Alex off him just as he came -- pushed a bit too hard: Alex landed on his ass and looked offended.

Burr crawled over to him and on top of him and kissed him, thoroughly, working his hand against the strained area in Alex's pants until Alex said (around a moan): "Burr."

"Yeah."

"Took you long enough to figure it out."


	30. the one where Burr is called "sir"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> i have it on good authority that everything stinks and the world needs more smut

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 18 August 2017.

It was never Burrr's idea. He comforted himself with that. Even the first time, Hamilton started it -- pushing Burr against a wall and kissing him like he had the right to do it, like he'd known how much Burr wanted it. Would want it.

Burr hadn't wanted it, til then.

But Hamilton's mouth was large and rough and his hands untied Burr's breeches and all of it happened so quickly, and with such a desperate delicious slowness, that Burr couldn't find it in himself to argue. Hamilton gave him the desire and fulfilled it in a single stroke. He took control so effortlessly, Burr didn't realize he had conceded anything.

And that is how he found himself developing rug-burn on his left cheek. On his face, that is.

Hamilton was working behind. He was sweating, and Burr liked that - he was swearing, and that was better - and in between swears he let go of tiny confidences that might, if stacked together, reveal something interesting.

"You," he said, and "sweetness," and "like that," and "never," and "every" and "best" and "please," -- he'd said all that, delicious words

and then he said "Sir

gasped out on a kiss. And if it was the kiss or the gasp or the word, Burr didn't know, but Hamilton trembled all over and inside him and started moving again, dropping the same wicked lying noise. "Sir," he said, "sir, please--" and actually bit down hard on Burr's shoulder, making a groan of pleasure like a cat in heat

while beneath him, stretched out and filled and still hungry, Burr shuddered and stiffened and came.

And Alex licked the sweat off his neck.


	31. the one I wrote at 1am

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 12 September 2017.

Thing is, Burr _likes_ Hamilton.

Always did. That skinny kid with a wild look in his eyes, skidding down a school hallway in rain-soaked shoes - and later too, when he'd grown steadier and broader across the shoulders but still with those big eyes, that intensity burning hot enough to start a fire -

Burr likes it. Wants it. Responds to it in a way he's used to associating with baser desires: fucking and food and fucking, sometimes sleep.

He's not comfortable with this new need, this call-and-response awareness. Sometimes he catches Hamilton looking at him too long, biting his mouth in uncharacteristic silence. It haunts Burr, stalks him in fevered dreams.

This _Hamilton_ doesnt sleep, and who knows if he ever dreams. He sneaks along the dark riverbank at night with a group of their old schoolmates-turned-fellow-soldiers, and somehow - Burr doesnt ask how - they steal a half-dozen British cannons.

 _Show-off_ Burr thinks, fond, before catching himself.

Hamilton spends afternoons drinking and plotting, spends evenings buried in some camp whore --

And they meet like that, one leaving the tent and one going in.

"Burr, sir," says Hamilton - the old unfunny line, the old self-satisfied amusement on his face.

Burr would like to wipe it off with a fist: or perhaps something more tender. "We keep meeting," he says. Tries for brevity and wit. Fails.

Hamilton is still looking at him, chewing on his bottom lip.

It's so odd and so comforting to see him unsure like this, that Burr dawdles. "Sorry if I tired her out," he says. "She'll recover soon."

Hamilton doesn't reply.

Burr leaves.

 

He thinks to light the candle in his tent but does not bother, it's easy enough to find the contraband bottle of whiskey, stolen on one of his own private raids.

 _Hamilton would never think me capable of it_ , he thinks, drinking. _He thinks I'm a coward. Men like that always - men like that - they don't - and I won't -_

He is halfway through the bottle and completely through thinking, at least for the night.

And something scratches at the tent. Some _one_. Because the _thing_  says his name, once and again more loudly, and before Burr can decide on whether he should answer or feign sleep, Hamilton has ducked inside.

He looks surprised to find Burr awake; he looks almost angry. He stuffs his hands in his pockets. "You didn't save any for me?"

"I don't _like_ you," says Burr.

"You just need to know me better. All the more reason to drink with me. We'll toast all the pretty girls we've fucked, and all the prettier ones we never had a chance with."

Burr laughs. Can't help it. But he takes the bottle back when Alex sets it back on the ground between them. "Keep your mouth off it."

"Aye, sir." Strange note in his voice. "What about a game?"

"What?"

"Never Yet In My Life. I say something, and if we havent done it, we take a drink."

"Hamilton-"

"Never Yet In My Life have I kissed a man." 

Burr is silent, hand on the bottle.

Hamilton's voice is rough; his eyes are all that is visible. He doesn't move at all towards Burr or away from him. "You aren't drinking, Aaron Burr."

"You," says Burr. "Um. You aren't drinking, Hamilton."

Hamilton takes the bottle and takes a drink and hands it back. "Better?"

No. Not better. But Burr can't explain why, not to himself and not to Hamilton and not tonight, thick and slow with liquor and sex and now weighed down with the knowledge Hamilton wants this too, wants to kiss him and maybe more -

\- he squirms, starts to talk, looking at where his hands are - he knows them even when he can't see them - and somehow when Alexander's mouth covers his own, Burr isn't surprised to find he knows Alex like that too, some primary intimacy built so long ago, neither could tell where it started or who they would be if it stopped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i might have been thinking of 'Survivor Types' lately.


	32. the one with a special present

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 2 Oct 2017, after whining to acanofpeaches that there are just NOT ENOUGH hamilton fics with sex toys, and why not?

"Um," said Burr.

Alex beamed. "Open it."

The couple at the table next to them looked over, took notice of the wrapped box Alex had slid across rhe table, and went back to their own conversation, appparently deciding no splashy public proposal was imminent.

Burr was equal parts grateful his boyfriend was not proposing, and annoyed this was happening at all - whatever it was. "You can't make me open it here," he said, studiously calm.

"I could unwrap it, I suppose. If you'd rather. But I might want to display it, and it's possible this is not something for --"

"Oh, shut up." And Burr separated the lid from the base -- frowned at the tissue paper -- frowned again at his lover, beaming across the white tablecloth -- and slid a hand into the box.

Metal? Smooth metal.

"You won't be able to guess," said Alex. "You have to actually look at it, Aaron Burr. Much as it pains you to show interest."

It did hurt him to show interest, and it was also annoying for Alexander to know that -- an Alexander who was practically squirming with anticipation.  
To punish him, Burr dawdled. Then he took off the tissue paper, and -- "You're fucking shitting me."

"Aaron Burr, we are in a FAMILY RESTAURANT. Lower your voice."

"You are obscene, and disgusting, and this is not a family -- and," he gave in, laughing. "How much did this cost you?"

"Surgical-grade stainless steel," said undaunted Alexander. "The finest taper, the most bulbous head."

"It's enormous."

"So I'm an optimist."

"Easy for you to say; you're not the one having to put a -- why is there a loop at the end?"

"Carry handle."

"Revolting," said Burr again, but this time he leaned over and kissed Alexander on the mouth. "I'm just grateful you weren't trying to propose."

"In public? What sort of person do you take me for?"


	33. the one where there is tenderness, of a sort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hamilton is dead: that much is certain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 25 June 2017.

_ Tender.  _

Hamilton never expected to call Burr that. Nor _gentle_ , nor _considerate_. Oh, he'd seen a sketch of those moods now and then, when a Theodosia was in question, but never more than that. He'd surely never been the object of that expression -- that affection.

But just now Burr slept with his mouth just parted and an unfamiliar mobility to his face.

He looked, Hamilton thought, relaxed.

He looked at rest.

A pain tugged at Hamilton's side. It was not the first time that looking at Burr made his old wound flare and ache. It seemed unjust: surely Hamilton was beyond all that? But no, the pain was tied up with being here at all, with his unaccountable desire to brush that stray goose-down feather off from Burr's cheek, to say all the things they hadn't had time to say -- in a field -- in New Jersey -- in July -- however many years ago.

Even if Hamilton could have spoken, he would have stayed silent. There was no chance for reconciliation, he thought. Burr had been too deeply hurt. A man did not simply return from a wound like that. He went to a tavern and ordered a meal and a drink and bled out quietly unto the floor.

It was harder for Burr. Hamilton had only to die.

\-- And to linger, watching fixedly the upturn of Burr's lips, his private griefs and rages. Burr found no reconciliation, and (watching) Hamilton thought there was none to be found -- not understanding how slowly it pushes up through the patient earth to bloom whitely where blood was shed.


	34. the one that's fanfic of A More Perfect Union (#2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a companion piece to chapter 13 of [A More Perfect Union](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7233154) (by the divine holograms)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 10 June 2017.

_Are you visiting whores because of me?_   Alex had almost-asked of him once, and Burr honestly didn't know the answer.  _ No _ , he'd wanted to say, and felt like it was a lie. But  _Yes _ would have been a lie too.

Now that Alex is gone -- on the other side of the deep and murky waters of the North Atlantic -- safely separate by weeks of travel and thousands of miles -- now Burr can say that traitorous  _yes _ .

And he does.

"Yes," to the quick question of the first whore who'll meet his eye, and _Yes_ when she asks if right here is good enough, and _Yes_ when she goes to her knees, and _yes yes yes I want you yes_  thinking of Alex, coming hard and too fast and surprising both of them.

She spits out and spits again and Burr hands her money -- their fingers grazing and it's the first time he's touched her -- and he's turned to go back to the rooms, head spinning, trying to be conscious of anything in this squalid place so he's not overtaken by louts, but all he can think is _Alex_

asking _do you want it like this_ and  _should I_  and  _do you want me too _

\-- dark eyes dark hair that crooked smile when he's pleased with himself and pleased with you -- would he smile like that after he's been fucked, would he still want Burr afterwards, would he would he would he keep wanting --

The ocean between them doesn't help this need.

He strokes off again in his rooms, swearing, and crawls into the sheets to lose himself in sleep.


	35. the one in which Hamilton shuts up, temporarily

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 14 June 2017.

Burr hadn't ever really believed Alex would stop talking, ever, until he was on his deathbed -- and from what Burr had heard of that near-occurrence, Alex hadn't shut up even then.

Burr should have asked Eliza.

Alex went quiet during sex. Not at the start, when he was all conversation and begging and noise, but somewhere near the middle. He'd be talking about some inconsequential thing, interrupting himself every moment with "Oh" and "there" and "yes, but do it again like you just did" and "You're delicious" 

\-- until gradually, the conversation dropped away and the interruptions only remained, just "Burr, when you" and "please? like you did it before" 

\-- and when the moment expanded and opened to take them both deep into its warmth, when Burr felt himself dissolve to elementals -- just sense without thought or deliberation -- then he must have done something different, made some interesting movement of his body or his mouth, because Alex shuddered and clenched tight his arms around Burr's back and the shiver went all through his body and through Burr too, so he shut his eyes and bit down with a reflexive need unto Alex's shoulder, just where the freckles bloomed over the sweet, rounded curve.

Alexander moaned out loud. 

He was so different here than he was in public. Here -- not just in personal conversation but in bed, in near-rapture -- his mind fell away, exposing something not deliberately shown but sometimes faintly glimpsed in his writing. His self-control dissolved as his words did, and Burr craved to see it.

More: he wanted to make it happen. 

Tonight the rain was sliding down the windowpanes. English rain, which was the marker of a dull dim week in America, meant only a normal day of things here across the waters. Burr didn't mind it all that much -- especially now that Alex was here and staying within doors had developing its own set of advantages. But the candles (they'd lit three, feeling extravagant for no reason at all) made Alex's skin glow rich and brown, like it held the sun inside it, and Burr could finally devote himself to tasting those freckles. He kissed them -- individually, and then licked them -- dotting his tongue and then kissing, kissing, biting now and then when it got to be too much, pushing forward into Alex when he started to look like he was coming down and ready to speak.

And Alex moaned.

It was hard to think about anything else when Alex moaned. Burr dragged his fingers down Alex's body, the softer form of age and decayed muscle where he'd been taut, young. He didn't miss it. The expression of age was no loss when youth to them had meant war and anger, violence. They'd learned some patience since then, he hoped. And forbearance.

Not that he felt that right now -- not with Alex beneath him, begging with eyes and swollen mouth and the arch and tilt in his hips and his body (god) tight and hot around Burr, and his voice stuttering out nonsense, words chained together without meaning, like he'd been brought to some edge and was ready to fall off.

Burr himself felt he was digging his nails into the side of the cliff. He was swearing -- sweating -- Alex's hands slipped off his waist and clenched at the thin cover of the mattress -- and they came not quite together, sticky and salty and absolutely ruinous to the inn's sheets.

Burr, recovering first, rolled off and stared at the ceiling.

A moment later Alex crawled back to him, put his head on Burr's neck, and went to sleep -- drooling almost at once.


	36. the one with hurt/comfort

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 27 June 2017.

"Hamilton?"

No response from inside the tent. That small snuffling sound went on.  Burr stood undecided. He was supposed to find Alexander and take him to the General, but if Hamilton was  occupied  ...  He grit his teeth. "Alexander? It's me." Pause. "It's Burr."

No response. 

Fuck it.  He lifted the flap and went in.

\--And he did indeed startle the man on the bed. Thank god, Burr thought, because Hamilton was alone. 

The next moment he felt sick with guilt again: Hamilton was crying.

Burr was too close to pretend he hadn't seen anything. He tried to apologize and duck out, thinking of excuses ("Hamilton was shitting his brains out, sir; it's going around again")

\-- but Alexander started to speak, managed only a few half words, and burst into such a messy volley of tears and snot (wiping a sleeve across his face) that Burr cringed and sat down next to him, unwilling to abandon such evident distress.

Alexander kept trying to talk -- of course -- and the words gradually cleared a bit. "M-married," he choked out. "Laurens is married."

Burr blinked. "Aren't you engaged to a woman yourself?"

"That," said a very haughty Hamilton, "is _different_."

"I see. Well. I'm terribly sorry about your friend, and now I --"

"Lover," said Hamilton. He was still sitting upright; twin spots of color had flared in his cheeks. "We were lovers. We are still." Another sniffle. "When the war permits."

"--Oh." Oh. Ohhh. "So he didn't ever -- he didn't tell you --"

A sob.

"I'm sorry," said Burr. Insignificant against the event, but what could he do? What else was in his power?

He found out when Hamilton kissed him.

Alexander's mouth was broad and warm and he tasted, Burr thought, like a sun-warmed field. He really tasted uncommonly good. Far better than any man had a right to taste. And Hamilton must have appreciated Burr, too, since he was pulling him nearer with both hands and making small greedy noises, even as he bit at Burr's lip to make him gasp and open his mouth and change the rather innocent kiss into something deeper -- wilder.

"Fuck me," said Burr: a heartfelt epigram.

"You mean it?" said Hamilton.

No, he hadn't meant it in that way: but now Alex was unbuttoning his jacket and biting his neck and Burr was aching for it, as mindalteringly strong as he'd ever felt in wanting a woman.

It got worse. Alex put his hand down into Burr's pants, and it got worse. He was gone in a moment, swearing and spluttering and kissing every portion of Hamilton he could find close enough to sink teeth into, and damn that Alexander but he was whining and rubbing at himself, too -- like Burr wasn't going to do anything? Didn't he know Burr believed in equality -- he was a man of just values, and a soldier too, and he would never leave a comrade in pain?

He fumbled at the buttons on Alexander's pants (too tight now to force his hand down past the waistband), and that was enough: Alex swore and clutched him and then bit his teeth down hard into Burr's shoulder, surely leaving a mark.

"Goddamn," said Burr, with mingled appreciation and guilt, watching the spreading stain on Hamilton's breeches. "Sorry about that."

Hamilton smiled lazily at him. "No apologies necessary, Mr Burr. _Sir_."

"Um. The General wants you."

"Is he the only one?"

"I believe Lee is there, as well."

"That's not what I meant, Aaron Burr, and well you know it." He was stripping efficiently, and glory glory, Burr was grateful all over again that he'd been quartered here.

But Hamilton himself ... Burr squirmed a little. "Well," he said. "The next time your heart is broken, little Lion, come and find me."

"Burr?"

"... yeah."

Hamilton licked his mouth. "I'm still real upset."

Burr found it hard to look away from that mouth -- and that tongue. "We can discuss it later," he said.

Hamilton kissed him. "Yes," he said, "sir."


	37. the one where Burr reads Tristram Shandy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the bits Burr reads really are from Tristram Shandy -- he really did read it.  
> it's a fantastic book, and i love him forever, and he and i are obviously soulmates IT IS JUST SO CLEAR

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 30 June 2017.

Theodosia Burr had been dead a year; her husband was returned to work. He was a little quieter around the mouth and his eyes were a little darker. Nobody much noticed. Aaron Burr wasn't well-liked (that thing about eating cake in the Senate); he'd never been laughing and vivacious; he'd never won friends easily. People avoided him slightly more nowadays, without noticing it.

He hadn't spoken to Alexander Hamilton in -- what, three months? Four? They'd drifted apart. Eliza had had the surviving Burrs over a few times for supper ("since you're here with us in New York, and we see so little of you nowadays") but no one was especially delighted with the circumstance -- Aaron Burr's natural reticence emerged even more in his grief, and Alexander was inadvertently rude any number of times, and Theo was at a supremely awkward stage of life, and Philip teased her, and shy Angie actually begged off after the first of these suppers.

So Burr didn't write anything more than a formal letter of sympathy when Philip turned up dead after a stupid duel, and none of the Hamiltons wrote back to him, and he wasn't especially surprised about it.

It was only seven weeks after the duel when they ended up in the same bar.

It was crowded; it was noisy; they were both already slightly drunk. Hamilton came and sank into the chair next to Burr (who was reading by the fire, and not especially pleased to be interrupted by a noisy companion -- as he expected that he would be interrupted even if Alexander wasn't talking right this moment, because Hamilton is Hamilton, world without end.)

One of them mumbled a greeting.

The other ignored it. -- And continued to ignore as Alexander squirmed, and craned his neck, and tried to read a few lines. "Stop that," said Burr, finally. "Get your own book."

"I haven't any. Give me yours. I left all mine at home. I'm bereft of books, Burr." Hamilton might have been more than slightly drunk. 

Burr ignored all this as well as he could, despite the noise and heat and general untidiness of the room -- until he heard a soft wet sound somehow underneath the nonsense. He looked over.

Hamilton was crying.

Nothing loud and ostentatious -- it wasn't his way in tears, apparently -- and the change was so outside the known character of Hamilton that Burr forgot himself, losing his own calm reserve, and sat upright.  "Christ," he said. 

Hamilton wiped his face; he turned away. "Leave me alone."

\-- But someone was looking at them, talking -- they were too well-known here.  So Burr took his book and Hamilton's hand and -- amid protest -- dragged him up the steps.

"Burr -- I'm not -- you can't -- I don't want --"

"Shut up," said Aaron Burr; he didn't respond to anything more until they were alone and behind closed doors. "Hamilton. Sit."

He looked shaky. He looked terrible. He sat.

Burr put a hand to his forehead -- feeling a strange sense of deja-vu. "You're warm. Take off your coat. Are you going to be sick?"

"Never sick," said Alexander, but he obediently disrobed.

"Shoes," said Burr, and opened the window a crack -- letting in the whistling wind -- as slowly, Hamilton took off his shoes, too,

Alexander looked a little better. At least, he didn't look as though he were likely to need the privy anytime soon. But his face was flushed and his eyes were huge, and he said: "Philip lost a library book."

"What?"

"He -- he didn't return a book, before -- he was reading it. He didn't finish it. And I couldn't find it, and so we paid for it."

"Christ."

Hamilton wiped his hand over his face and nose, like a child. "I found it, tonight. He'd just misplaced it on the shelves. Or someone did. A maid. I don't know. But I wanted, I wanted to take it back to that man and throw it in his face. How dared he -- he sent out that bill, Aaron. He knew Phil had been, he knew what happened, he knew we were in mourning and he sent us a bill --" He covered his mouth.

Burr considered him -- considered his own pain -- the distances between them, present and former -- and finally said: "The first business I tended to after Theodosia passed, was to settle all her doctor's bills." He hesitated, but -- "I wanted to ignore them, truthfully. But I couldn't bear to see them come up again, resurfacing." Like a body, he wanted to say, did not say, because Hamilton's shoulders were shaking and he had both palms to his eyes and -- 

Again that traitorous sensation of deja-vu: but this time the sick one wasn't his wife, and the mourner wasn't his daughter. It was a frustrating ornery immigrant with freckles standing livid on his face and dark hair just falling out of its ribbon and eyes that looked like someone had shot him, instead of his child, and let him bleed out and turn cold in some horrible field.

Burr couldn't bear it. He said, like he were talking to Theo: "You were asking about my book?"

"--What?"

"My book. You were trying to read it. Book thief," he said, and was rewarded with a sketch of an expression. Confusion. It would do. He cleared his throat. "It's a new work, the fourth volume just printed. _Tristram Shandy_ , named. I'll read to you, if you like."

"Not much use if I don't know the first three."

"I think you'll follow it well enough. The plot isn't linear. And it rambles and jumps about to such an extent that -- really, Alexander! It just came to me that the structure is like a conversation with you."

"And yet you're reading it," said Hamilton. "Go on, tell me." He sniffled -- a disgusting sound.

"Don't you have a handkerchief? Take mine."

Hamilton shook his head. "Eliza didn't -- she used to look over my packing, you know, but lately she's been -- so."

"I should think your manservant could do it for you." Burr sat down on the bed, not too close, and flipped pages.

"I fired him."

"Hamilton. Really?"

"He was found having inappropriate relations."

Burr thought that "inappropriate relations" were a commonplace for the Hamilton household: but maybe Alexander wanted to keep all such practices to himself. He cleared his throat again. "Shall I begin?  _In the beginning of the last chapter, I informed you exactly when I was born; but I did not inform you how. No, that particular was reserved entirely for a chapter by itself;—besides, Sir, as you and I are in a manner perfect strangers to each other, it would not have been proper to have let you into too many circumstances relating to myself all at once --_ Alexander, for the love of God, stop that disgusting noise and take my handkerchief. Do I need to hold it over your nose, too?"

Hamilton shook his head, but he was smiling a little; he blew obediently and offered it back.

"Keep it," said Burr. "You're disgusting." 

Alexander put his head on his shoulder. "Keep reading."

_"If I should seem now and then to trifle upon the road,—or should sometimes put on a fool's cap with a bell to it, for a moment or two as we pass along,—don't fly off,—but rather courteously give me credit for a little more wisdom than appears upon my outside;—and as we jog on, either laugh with me, or at me, or in short do any thing,—only keep your temper."_

"What chapter is this?"

"Seventeen."

"In the fourth volume? Do you mind if I lay?"

"The frontispiece is in the second," said Burr -- and laughed outright. "Lay down, if you want. I'll ... I'll lay next to you, I suppose," because Hamilton flopped down with drunken purpose, and the movement of the old ropes threw Burr down too. They were practically snuggling. "Fine," he said, not altogether uncharitably. _"In the same village where my father and my mother dwelt, dwelt also a thin, upright, motherly, notable, good old body of a midwife ..."_

He read along for a while -- and the more he read, the most quiet Alexander became -- until his breathing was slow and steady, and Burr's eyes were tired, and he put down the book with a sigh. "Are you asleep?"

A mumble.

"Fine," said Bur again; he turned a little on his side and looked at Hamilton, in the dusk that was fallen.

He looked, Burr thought, desperately fragile -- his eyelids as translucent as flower-petals after a storm, and his cheeks streaked high with the red of the beers he'd drank. Deep moon-rings hung on either side of his nose, and his mouth was slightly parted.

Fucking brat, thought Burr -- and bent to kiss his forehead.


	38. the one where the relationships are canon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 4 June 2017.

She slept in bed too long, lingering in the relative coolness of early morning. It was past dawn when she wandered over the house lowering window-shades and changing the water in the vases. And there was a tumult downstairs -- shouting, and a rush of heavy feet, and a muffled groan.

She stood still. She couldn't move just yet; she couldn't face this -- whatever this was -- this replication of the noise that woke her when Philip -- 

Alexander was there. _Thank god_ , she thought. Thank god he's alive, because she wanted to _kill_ him for giving her this worry. "Who did this?"

Alex moaned.

"I'm not asking  _you_ ," she snapped. "Mr Pendleton --"

"Burr," said Pendleton. He was leaning over her husband; he would not look her in the eye. "They had a disagreement."

"Where is he injured?"

Burr was not a good shot. Likely Alex was caught through the leg, or --

"His side," said the doctor. "Near the hip."

"I'm so sorry," said her husband. "Betsey? I should have told you."

She didn't answer. Instead she went forward to his head and pushed back some hair that was falling in his face. He was dreadfully hot, he was sweating -- "You should have told me," she said to him. "Did you at least injure Mr Burr?"

"Deloped," he said on a gasp.

The idiot. She steadied her breath. "Next time, Alexander, you must be certain to shoot him properly."

"Next time," he said. "Next. Betsey. I'm sorry."

No. No. She went cold and sick -- "Don't you dare apologize."

"Didn't mean to do this," he said. "To you. Again."

"Stop acting like a fool and you won't have anything to be sorry over."

Someone touched her shoulder, drawing her away, saying "Mrs Hamilton? We need to move him now--"

 

And she stood back while they took him upstairs, to their bed. Her bed. His deathbed.

She'd seen that look on too many faces.

 

She was swaying on her feet, talking fast to a servant whose name she couldn't remember, held upright by Angelica who was saying  _Let me do this_  and  _Let me get that for you_  and  _A pot of tea will help_  and _Steady_ , her mouth a grey grim line, eyes snapping furious. Thank god she was here. How often Eliza had been envious of her sister, the ten-page letters that flew back and forth between England and America, the way Alexander snorted with laughter and read and re-read them and tucked them away quite neatly, like something precious and rare, when he kept his other correspondence in what could be called (at best) a desultory state -- how often had she held back to let them trade witticisms and flirting -- never mind that he was married to Eliza, and Angelica herself married to John Church -- 

Nevermind all that now. Nevermind. Because Angelica was here, and her shoulders were stiff and straight and angry, and she was the only other person in the world now who loved Alexander as desperately as Eliza did herself.

 

"That  _wretch_ " (Angelica was writing a quick note.) "That _violent degenerate_ , that  _Burr_  -- it's not enough to shoot at my own husband? He needed to shoot yours, too?"

"Alexander agreed to the duel." She felt numb. Her lips felt numb. Her hands were unsteady and her husband was dying and she could not feel it at all. "John agreed, too. They knew what might happen."

Angelica spoke through gritted teeth. "It won't happen. He's not going to die." As though she could keep him from it with the force of her will.

Eliza didn't answer.

 

Morning crawled to afternoon to evening, and now a quick storm broke over the city, and now the window-shades were drawn up again and the casements opened to catch whatever breeze might come in off from the Hudson. It was almost temperate, for July.

And Alexander was sweating. "Betsey? Betsey?"

"Hush. I'm here. Don't waste your energy to cry out like that."

"I need to write," he told her.

She sponged off his forehead. "I'll write for you. What do you want to say?"

"Tell the General," and then he cried out again, and writhed, kicking his feet against the bedclothes. It hurt her to look at him.

He said: "Burr? Where is Burr? Tell him--" 

And he was silent again.

"I'll tell him. Alexander, don't worry so. Just rest.  _Breathe_."

"I'll pray," he said. "I never used to do that. Do you remember?"

She remembered.

"Is the priest coming yet?"

He had been and gone. They'd had to argue with three different churches, first.  _Why is he injured_ , the holy men asked, like that fact mattered more than the dying did. "He's coming. He'll be here soon."

"Soon?"

"Very soon."

"Angelica?"

"She's resting. She's here. She's in your office."

"Tell her. Tell Burr. I ought to have apologized. Betsey? Betsey. Don't leave. I'm sorry."

She tried to smile at him: "See now, was that so difficult?"

"It hurts," he said, like a child.

She did not know if he meant the wound or his pride. She said: "I know."

He made noises -- not speech, but what could have been speech -- and Eliza bent her head over his hand, praying for what, she didn't know -- a stream of please god please. Like it mattered.

Alexander lapsed into silence then, and she was almost asleep -- almost -- when 

"John?" he said, looking past her

and went still.


	39. the one with a lot of kissing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 25 June 2017.

Alexander has fought this for so long, the fight is become an automatic reflex, the tap of a hammer on his knee and his leg swinging out straight.

So when Burr kisses him --

 

See, Alex doesn't want to kiss Burr. He  _doesn't_. He isn't into Aaron Burr -- not his quick clever eyes nor the long line of leg in stockings nor whatever curves and valleys he hides inside his clothes, like he's anything less than perfect. Alex is not ashamed of liking boys (as well as girls), that's not the problem, boys are beautiful too, and often smell quite good, and oh he _did_ like that Laurens--

 

Burr does not kiss like Laurens.

He's more self-assured, for one. It's a trait Alex was always drawn to, all that money and breeding and class knotting together into a sense of infallibility, oh he  _wants_  it, desperate to eat it and to rub himself on it and come hard. 

Burr kisses like he knows all that, and he's interested in Alex too _(slumboy gutterboy immigrant whoreson)_  

and his tongue licks at Alex's mouth and it's making him weak at the knees

 

Alex has to stop kissing back.

He has to. He will.

But he's wanted this _(alright, he can admit it)_

 

wanted Burr's hand to rest on him just like that, tugging Alex in closer, fingers splayed out -- possessive and sure

\-- the way he bites now at Alex's throat, like a beast tasting something it's already killed

 

oh _that mouth_ \-- Alex watched that mouth all morning long and now it's pressed against his skin, he's helpless against it

like he's always been when faced with the slow certain movement of his own desires

a rising tide to hide all the rocks of doubt.


	40. the one with the dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex and Aaron share a bed, because Plot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written early October 2017.

Burr was asleep - not unusual; he slept like a soldier, anywhere and at any time he was able.

Alexander had been awake two hours.

The moonlight woke him first, and then a lonely frog began chattering to itself directly (it seemed) beneath their window, and now, well.

Now it was Burr’s fault.

He was warm and he smelled good and his expression looked unusually mild and - god help them both - he was dreaming. Making small noises.

Alexander did not want to know what Burr dreamed.

He would just - he’d just roll on his side, that was all. He’d turn away and stop trying to pick out meaning from that peaceful face. No matter how it looked right now, it was still Burr underneath. And Burr would not thank Alex for excavating his secrets.

Burr mumbled something. His mouth twitched.

A smile? A grimace?

It didn’t matter. Alexander was going to turn away. He was going to. He absolutely was going to do that.

Except Burr said “Alex”, in a voice almost like his waking one. And he seemed to breathe faster.

Alex didn’t move.

“Please,” said Burr.

So Alex did.

He put one hand on that warm cheek and the other against the mattress, to hold his weight up, and he kissed Burr. Not hard and assured, not timidly seeking: Alex kissed him like he’d been kissing him for years, like he knew all the ways Burr would respond and how he would touch back. He kissed him like all their future was laid out clearly: this is how we fall in love.

And Burr did respond.

He opened his mouth and his eyes and made a noise Alex had never heard and shut his eyes again and kissed back, holding on to the shoulder of Alex’s shirt, sitting upward without breaking the kiss.

Alexander broke it. He was shivering, though the night was warm, and he found himself hardening fast and thinking impossible things like _If he took me, if he took me tonight and here and now, if he could only —_

So he shifted away. Tried to collect himself. Tried not to touch.  
Instead he brushed his thumb over Burr’s mouth - simply because he wanted to do it, because he’d wanted to do it so damn long. “Aaron Burr,” he said.

And Burr reached out to touch him, looking wistful and open and dear, _so_ dear that Alex leaned in again for the kiss he knew was coming —

 

And got a hard elbow in his back. “Wake up,” said sour Burr. “You’re making a terrible racket.”

“Sorry,” said Alex; he felt himself blush. “Just a dream.”


	41. the one with Burr’s uncle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> high school AU.
> 
> um.
> 
> trigger warning?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written sleepyface 21-22 October 2017.

A small, moist noise.

Alexander stopped. Peered down. “Burr? What are you doing in there? What’s that sound? Are you crying? Shit, you are crying. What happened?”

A face looked out at him and then away. “I never cry.”

Alexander didn’t find it worthwhile to argue. He crawled into the tight dark space behind the gym bleachers and sat near Burr. “Sure sounds like you’re crying.”

“I do not cry.”

“Maybe it’s raining,” said Alex.

“Maybe you’re a brat and you should leave me alone.”

Alex heard worse than that on a daily basis: he only shrugged. “Talking might help.”

“I never talk,” said Burr.

“Golly,” said Alexander. “No wonder everyone wants to sit with you at the lunch tables. The way you just open up to people, it’s really something.”

Burr made a sound very much like a snort. “ _Gee wiz, Hamilton._ Could it be that I’ve told you to leave me alone three times already and you’re still here?”

Alex stretched out his legs - there was just room for them. “I stopped your waterworks anyway.”

“Fuck you.” There was no heat to it. “I live with my uncle. He’s being a prick.”

“Oh, right. Aren’t your folks dead or something like that?”

“You’re the king of class and delicacy, aren’t you. Yeah. They’re dead. Or something like that. He took me in.”

“What’s the problem? Does he beat you?”

Burr made an impatient motion. “It’s not that. I want - I want to go to college. I’m smart enough, I can get in, I know it - but I’m underage, I need him to sign the paperwork, and he refuses to do it. Jesus.” He rubbed his face. “I must be stupid to tell you this. Of all people.”

Alexander should have taken offense at that - and did - but the larger part was flared up in joy. Heat and envy and _recognition_. He’d been filling out applications himself, taking them in stacks to his foster father for the necessary signatures, writing quick emphatic essays about immigration and poverty and illness and race relations and —

And Aaron Burr was still looking forward, lip quivering. “I can’t get out if no one will give me a chance.”

“Get out? Out of where? You’re so rich you’re practically gentry. Where the fuck do you need to go?”

“Money isn’t everything.”

“Says the rich boy,” said Alex, and regretted it. “Sorry. Nevermind. Forget I said it.”

“Sure. And you forget all of this conversation happened, okay? Forget my name and my face while you’re at it.“ He moved out from the bleachers and brushed himself off, looking furious and fragile. “I’ve got to go.”

“No. Look, I apologized, I - stick around, will you? Where are you going?”

“Sorry,” said Burr, not looking sorry at all. “Terribly busy. I have to go attend a meeting about how to oppress the underclasses for fun and profit. Nothing you’d be interested in.” Pause. “Immigrant.”

“Dammit, dammit, dammit - Burr!" But by the time he crawled out, banging his head on every protuberance, Burr was gone.

 

*

 

Burr was reading, deep in it, and didn’t hear the first time his uncle called him to answer the door.

The second time found him sprawled flat on the floor, books scattered and his vision full of stars. “Sorry,” he was saying, crawling backwards, “sorry, I didn’t hear you, what -“

“Get the fucking door,” said his uncle. He hadn’t even raised his voice.

And Burr fled.

 

*

 

He twisted the knob with an admirably steady hand.

The shaking would come later, when he was alone, when things were safe and quiet and the world was silent and dark -

Burr wasn’t doing a lot of sleeping these days -

He should have known who it would be.

*

Hamilton’s smile was broad and convincing, albeit ingenuine. “Burr! So good to see you. Ready for that study session?”

For a second Burr wondered just how hard he had fallen. If he was making study dates with Alex Hamilton, well - he’d need a neurosurgeon to fix the damage to his reasoning center. He stammered.

“Don’t stand there with the door open,” said his uncle, and that was the decider. Burr jerked his head, saying “My room’s upstairs.” He went to the table and bent over, collecting books and papers, steeling his face. Already a tight knot of pain was stiffening his neck. He must have pulled something.

“You two be quiet,” said his uncle.

“We’re only studying.”

“No backtalk either.”

“Yes, sir.” He waited a moment for the next event, but that was it: he’d been corrected enough, or enough for now: his uncle returned to clicking channels on the television.

And Burr fled.

 

*

 

Hamilton prowled. It was very annoying. He picked up a large seashell and held it to his ear, listening for who knew what. “You don’t have a lot of things.”

“For a rich boy, you mean?”

Alex looked up; he set down the conch. “Do you need me to apologize again?”

Burr looked away. “I don’t have a lot of things because I don’t have a lot of space.”

“Oh, come on. You live in the biggest closet I’ve ever seen.” This might have been truthful. It was, in fact, a closet - and just large enough for a twin bed - and a slim dresser - and a very small desk, set at an awkward angle towards the door because it wouldn’t fit any other way. “It’s absolutely palatial.”

Burr said: “Please stop calling me royalty.”

“Sorry. Look,” and Alex dropped the polite tones, “I can help you. We can help each other.”

“You’ve already made things worse.” God, his neck hurt. He tried to rub it unobtrusively.

Alex ignored this dismissal. “You need a signature, right? Well. I know a guy who can hook you up.”

At least Hamilton was keeping his voice low. “I need a _legal signature_.”

“No problem. He can match whatever you’ve got.”

Burr shook his head. “And then what? I just disappear? And he doesn’t notice I’m gone? I have no access to money. How am I going to get there? Much less eat, clothe myself, pay for housing, buy books-“

“A scholarship would pay for that.”

“Hamilton. No. It’s impossible. I can’t do it.”

Alex was pink across the cheeks. He dropped his head and picked at the weave on the blanket. He said: “I did it.”

The fuck he had. Burr rubbed his neck and glared.

Alexander started talking fast. “I don’t have much spending money but I saved it and sent it in with some applications and two colleges said they were interested and they’re offering- What are you doing?”

“Nothing. It’s nothing. I pulled something.”

“Move your hand. Let me see.”

“No. Go away.”

“Shut up and let me look at it,” said Hamilton, more kindly than he’d spoken before.

And Burr did. He sat numb while Hamilton ran a light hand over his shoulder and then the back of his neck, and he didn’t move when Alex murmured something and started to press in with his fingers, and if Burr let out a noise as his stiffness and tension were rubbed away, there was no one to hear it but themselves.  
And then Alex dug in his thumb on top of a new bruise, and Burr jerked away. He straightened, face hot and looking anywhere else, trying to think of an explanation.

Alex flipped up the back of Burr's shirt and swore aloud. “I thought you said he didn’t beat you.”

“He didn’t hit me tonight. That bruise was from the floor.”

“Floors don’t bruise unless you fall on them, Burr. And these old scars aren’t from any fall.” He touched along the exposed skin. “What was it? A belt?”

Burr twisted the fabric loose. “I told you to leave me alone. I told you and I asked you and what do you do but show up here and cause me more trouble.”

Alexander had a grim tightness to his mouth. He said: “It’s not going to get better by ignoring it.”

“It’s not going to _get better,_ period. You don’t -“

“Shh,” and Alex was tugging at Burr again, trying to get him to turn around. “I wasn’t finished. Let me finish and then you can ream me out - I mean, tell me off.” He was rubbing again as he spoke, solicitous now of the swelling and bruising, and started talking nonsense - just to get to run his mouth, thought Burr - but the noise plus the hands were strangely soothing. He shut his eyes and let Alex tend him awhile.

Something brushed the nape of his neck.

Burr tensed.

“Shh,” said the voice in his ear - very quiet, very close - and those long talented fingers worked into what there was of his hair, kneading and tugging at it, until another one of those soft sounds came out of Burr and Alex kissed his neck again.

Burr did jump up this time, staring.

“I told you that we have something to offer the other,” said Hamilton, talking fast. “I’ll forge the signature - I’m good at it - done it a million times - and my fosters will pay your way, I’m sure of it. And if they don’t, well, I’ll find something. We’ll figure it out. Please, Burr. _Please._ ”

It was that second _please_ that kept Burr from throwing Hamilton out a window and then jumping out himself. “So - what - you’ll do it for sex? If I fuck you?”

He tried to say that he couldn’t, he wouldn’t, even for college and freedom he wouldn’t do it. The words stuck in his throat. Why bother lying. He’d do anything and anyone to get out.

Hamilton looked appalled. “I only want to kiss you, for Christ’s sake.”

Burr waited. People didn’t bother to negotiate for a kiss.

This must have shown on his face: Alex squirmed. “Well. I mean. I figured if I just went in for it, you’d probably punch me.”

“Wise move. I do get into a lot of fistfights.”

Alex moved a little bit nearer. “Do you usually win?”

It was difficult to breathe, having Alex so close and knowing what he wanted - what he was going to do. “I’ve never lost.”

“Sure,” said Alex, disbelieving: and then they were kissing.

Alex was kissing. Burr held very still and let it happen - carefully thinking of nothing at all - until Alex shifted his weight and something in his trousers brushed against Burr — he knew what it was, he was hardening, too - and he realized he was enjoying this.

He wanted this. He wanted this and it was here and it was in the form of Alex Hamilton, who just now was looking scared and almost hurt, whose eyes were dark and full of shadows, who had offered to help him, who’d promised to only kiss and hadn’t done anything more -

Burr put his hand on Alex’s waist and kissed back.

 


	42. the one in which no one dies even a little bit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 23 October 2017.

“A long, long time ago, years and years before you were born, there were two young men in a new nation. One was poor and one was wealthy, but they were more alike than they were different. Both of them were were brave and brilliant and ambitious.” (Pause.) “And attractive. They were both very attractive.” (Pause.) “But mostly they were foolish. Are you listening?”

“Yeth.”

“There was a war going on, so they enlisted. And -“

“Whath that?”

“Enlisted? It means they signed up to become soldiers. One of them went north and one went south. One was showered with honors, and the other ... was not.” (Clears throat.) “After the war, they settled down here, in New York City. They had married wonderful ladies, you see, and by then they had families and small children - so of course there wasn’t any too much money. Are you awake?”

“M’wake.”

“So they were idle and restless. They decided to become lawyers and work together. It even worked out, for a while. The mouthy one - your pa’s father - always stole his partner’s good ideas, and the quiet ... You’re asleep, little one.”

He was. But Burr wasn’t finished. “After that, things fell apart. Things do that when you don’t tend them. Well, he went on his ways and I went on mine, and we squabbled, and I shot him, and then -“

“That’s a rather abbreviated history,” said Hamilton, entering the room and catching the tail end of the story. “What lies are you telling my grandson?”

“The story of tonight, Alexander. Come here and let me remind you how it goes.”


	43. the one that’s fic of a fic (#2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sometimes i write fic about ‘A More Perfect Union’, alright 
> 
> here, they’re returning to America.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 23 October 2017.

The ship moans and creaks, and Alexander moans along with it. They’ve sailed into a storm, and Hamilton claims to be sea-sick. Burr has his doubts. Sufferers usually preferred not to speak, and Alex has not shut up since the first slosh of water soaked under the door into their cabin. He says “You know what I miss most?”

Burr counts to three. “I miss silence.”

“Coffee. And beaten biscuits. And -“

“You said one thing.”

“Well, breakfast, then. All the kids at the table,” (his voice clouds briefly), “Eliza sitting at the head - she’s so pretty in the mornings, Burr. You wouldn’t believe it.”

“I have seen her in the mornings, you know.”

Alex scoffs. “You don’t hardly rise until ten.”

“I usually sleep at three, and-“

“What do you miss?”

“Theo,” says Burr.

“Aside from that.”

“Hamilton-“

“ _Please_ ,” says Alex. 

And it’s dark as pitch, and the ship is still rolling and making terrible noises, and, all right, Burr doesn’t like it much more than Hamilton does. He smells salt and dead things.

He finds Alex’s hand and grips it.

Alex clenches tightly back.

“What do I miss. Um. Breakfast, yes. Warm toast.”

He feels Hamilton laugh, the sound muffled. “I will never understand the British love of cold, burnt toast.”

“Heathens, all of them.” Unbidden rose up the memory of Alexander, sometime last year: he was bathed in early sunlight and reading the morning paper; he swatted swatted Burr’s hand away when Burr tried to take a section to read.

He had looked (Burr thinks) freshly fucked.

It makes him ache. He says: “I miss my plant.”

“Your what?”

“In my office. From Van Ness.”

“ _Our_ office.”

“My _plant_.”

“I watered it,” says Alex. “I talked to it. I wanted to keep it alive for you. I sang.”

Burr wants to tease him about this - Alex has a voice like an old carriage, all bump and clatter - instead he runs his hand up Alex’s arm to his shoulder to his neck and face and mouth and he’s pulling them together, not in lust but comfort.

He feels Alex shudder and feels him begin to relax, slow as anything, but Burr doesn’t let him go until Alex’s breath is steady and even and he is asleep.


	44. the one when it’s their first time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sweet fluffy modern au  
> AWWWW

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 26 December 2016.

Alex was rubbing his hands together, explaining the different properties of silicone versus water-based, when Burr slapped his hand over his mouth. "Shhhhh."

Wide eyes looked back at him.

Burr put his mouth next to Alex's ear. "My uncle. Walking around. Wait a minute."

"Don't wanna wait," said Alex, disobedient but quiet about it. He stroked Burr lightly, with one damp finger. "Wanna go."

Burr whimpered. "Fuck me."

"That's the idea."

"I'm gonna _kill_ you," but he was smiling now again. "Or anyway my uncle will, if he f-f-finds us -- Alexander!"

"Ready? I'm going in. Are you ready? Tell me you're ready."

"How would I know?"

"I'm gonna put a finger inside you."

Burr started to laugh -- actually to giggle. "That's so gross, Alex."

"If you don't show some respect to your betters, I'll push you face-first into the mattress, and I won't touch you at all, and you'll have to -- Okay. Does that hurt?"

"It feels ... bizarre."

"Stop that giggling, Aaron Burr. I can't believe you're giggling. Our first time was supposed to be special. You're not taking it seriously at all."

"I can't believe you actually put your finger in my --"

"That's what sex is!"

"Can we try making love instead? Would that be that less sticky? Because, not gonna lie, this is pretty gross."

Pounding on the wall. "AARON."

Both of them froze. "Yes, sir?"

"Stop talking to yourself and go to sleep."

"Yes," said Burr, and choked on the "Sir!" as Alex abruptly pulled his fingers out.

Another moment of waiting and they were at it again, more quietly this time. "Tell me what to do."

"Relax," said Alex, and stroked him some more. "Just. Relax. Okay?"

"Okay."

"I want you, Aaron Burr."

"I want you. I want -- I want you. I want to do this with you. I trust you. Alex? Alex?"

Silence.

"Alexander? I need you to talk right now."

Alex bit his mouth; Burr whimpered, and Alex grinned. "The only thing I want to hear from you is my name. Or 'yes'. Or 'more.' Or --"

"Fuck," said Burr.

"That too. Does that hurt?"

"Yes. No. It's fine. Are you stopping? Don't fucking stop. I didn't fucking tell you to stop, Alexander, don't you even dare--“

Alex was shivering. "Almost all the way. Aaron, hold still. You need to stop wiggling or I'm gonna fall out."

"I can't. This feels so strange -- oh. Oh." Because Alex had started to move.

"Is this okay?"

"More than okay. More than -- more than -- Alexander, I --"

Alex bit him again. "What did I say? Only Yes or More or my name."

"Fuck," said Burr. "Fucking fuck."

"Not an approved word, Aaron Burr." He reached between their bodies to circle Burr with thumb and forefinger, moving it downward with the smallest motions, watching Burr's eyes heavily shut and his breath turn uneven and jagged. He kissed the hollow of his throat. "Try again."

He moved further in, pressing them together as far as possible, feeling himself hit something marvelous, feeling Aaron choke on desire, feeling himself start to lose control. He had to be careful; he had to go slowly. _Aaron, Aaron._ But he was so sweet and so soft and didn't he smell amazing, didn't he smell like ink and woodsmoke and old bookstores?

"Jesus," said Burr. "Alex, more?"

"I didn't quite understand those words," said Alex, barely hanging on to the conversation. Every push inward sent his nerves jangling and his skin twitching in the dear spots, and Aaron was clenching and hotter than sin and actually moaning, and it was pretty clear he thought he was bearing up under this with something really flashy in the way of composure but honestly he was falling apart, and watching him crumble was taking Alex down too --

He held still.

He'd forgotten to rub at Aaron for a while; now he went back to it, rubbing the wet down from the tip, putting it to his mouth and adding his own spit, watching as Burr flinched and licked his mouth. "Alexander."

God, was anything better than hearing his own name? "Yeah?" He started moving again, slowly this time. Couldn't help it. Couldn't stop.

Burr was moaning openly now; Alex kissed him, muffling the noise, licking and biting his mouth, whimpering in return, and then Burr said "Alex," on the beginning of a shudder and a clench against him and it was too much, too much; Alex lost it entirely, and his hand tightened, and he felt it as Burr did too.

They lay together silent now, letting their breathing slow and their minds clear.

"Aaron?"

"Yeah." A smile now in that beloved voice.

"You okay?"

"More than. Was that -- did I do anything -- strange? Or wrong?"

It took Alex a full second to understand that Burr was embarrassed. Or worried about being embarrassed. Something. "You are fine." No. That wasn't enough. He tried to remember words. "You are beautiful. You are _extraordinary_ \--"

“Okay. Okay. I get it. You don't need to lay it on with a trowel."

“Not lying. Not exaggerating. Aaron Burr, I --" He stopped.

"Don't say that either," said Burr, still with his eyes shut.

Alex kissed him. "I'll save it for next time, then."

“Next weekend?"

Sleepy Burr. Sweet Burr.

"Tomorrow,” said Alex.


	45. the one where Alex is lonely

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> long-distance relationships stink. even when it's only a couple of weeks apart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 24 December 2016.

Three weeks.

It's the longest Alex has gone  _ without _in his entire adult life, he's sure. Three goddamn weeks that Aaron Burr has been gone out of town, and of course there are text messages that almost-but-not-quite convey the quick, intelligent amusement of Burr's voice, and there is Skype, which Burr hates because of course he does but he agreed to do it with Alex --  _ for _him. Not  _with _ him. Because he rolled his eyes and threatened to sign off when Alex dared to suggest anything dirty.

Three. Goddamn. Weeks.

Alex rolls on to his back and stares at the ceiling.

It's not only the sex. He's used to waking up curled around Burr, sleeping skin to skin, having someone near by for casual contact -- brushed elbows in the kitchen, a hand fixing his shirt-collar in the morning ...

He didn't really expect to miss Burr this much.

He kicks at the sheets.

He doesn't want to jerk off, either. He wants -- he wants ...

His eyes slide closed, thinking of what he wants. When he had it. The first time he had it.

Burr had him up against a wall, kissing hard, and for all of Alex's impatience he didn't expect this response, he thought Burr would be slow and deliberate, but an deliberate was accurate enough but there was nothing slow about his hand down Alex's pants, working there briefly before he dropped to his knees.

"Jesus fuck," Alex remembered saying.

He remembered too how easily Burr took him in, like it was nothing to open his mouth; he moved back almost at once and left the length wetly exposed to air, and when Burr licked delicately around the head his breath came out hot and  _fuck _ Alex almost lost it right there

 

He's got his hands on himself now. Poor substitute. He can't tease himself, like this; he can't run a finger inside and crook it to find the nerve; he can't press kisses down the curve of his own waist (oh Aaron)

He can't --

 

His legs splay open; he shifts down a little; he moans.

Okay, well, it's not all bad.

_ If Burr were here _ he thinks, and maybe that's the wrong idea because Burr is one hell of a prickly bastard when he wants to be, he's barely cooperative at the best of times, and whatever reason they're bedfellows is lost on Alex but there's got to be something selfish in it, or Burr wouldn't stay.

 

Think of Aaron, then.

Aaron.

He almost never comes out, this soft portion; Burr is almost all angles. Every so often --

After they first went to bed. He'd gone down on Alex and didn't seem to expect (or especially want) reciprocation, but Alex worked his way south and by the time he took him in hand and mouth, Burr was almost begging, making the smallest whimpering huffs, his eyes soft and unfocused. "Alex?" he'd said at last, and it was too much, Alexander swallowed deep and Burr -- Aaron -- tensed all over and looked entranced.

 

The next time was when he'd brought a showering Alex a clean towel; the next time was during some story about life on Nevis that he'd thought Burr wasn't even listening to, and then he looked up to see that peculiar quietness --

 

His hand's moving fast now and his thumb is pressing deep on the ridge with the downstroke and it's not enough, not enough, he needs a body against his own body

anyone would do, Gil or Laurens or  _(Aaron Aaron Aaron) _ Maria, he could call her, couldn't he, wouldn't she _(Aaron)_  come by --

He comes.

When the white clouds clear out from his vision he feels almost sick, almost guilty, although he and Burr aren't exclusive and Alex didn't so much as send a dirty emojii.It's the jerking off, and it's not enough. Not enough.

He breathes steady a while and then gets his phone.  _ Miss you _ _,_ he sends, like an idiot. Then:  _Guess I got used to having you around. _

A few minutes pass before Burr replies.

_ Two more days, Hamilton. _

Yeah. He knows. It's not like he's got the date marked in his calendar or anything. He types a reply, deletes it. He's just decided to turn the phone off for the night (he could use some goddamn rest) when it buzzes in his hands.

 

sms: Aaron  
_ I miss you too. _


	46. the one with transgendering and general cuteness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a wee slip of Transgender Aaron Burr, written for dear (AO3 user) hamburr.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 1 January 2017.

"Your horse," said Alexander, "seems to have escaped you."

The boy -- or young man -- tossed a long trail of hair out of his face and made a foul expression. "I see that. And I thank you, sir."

Alexander bit down on a laugh. "It's all right. I'm only twitting you. Come on -- can you handle her from here?"

"Well enough."

He seemed to have some struggle to get into the saddle again, however. After two attempts, he let down and stood to the side, leaning his head against the flank. "Need a lift?" What sort of rank beginner was he?

The young man shook his head -- he really wasn't as young as he'd seemed at first, though his face was bare. "In a moment I'll be well enough."

Alexander swore under his breath and dismounted. He came over to see what the matter was -- and saw instead the lad's face was streaked with tears. No wonder he'd hidden it.

"She injured my ankle a bit, I think, rolling. I can't -- I can't quite --"

"Can I assist? Here, you're light enough; come pillion and we'll lead your mare."

"I can't --"

"Hush, of course you can." God, had Alexander ever been so young? He wondered if it was money or coddling -- or both -- that created this sort of deference and timidity. "Up -" And he settled himself. "Hold on," he said, trying not to laugh. "You don't want to fall off again."

"She hit a divot," said the boy, voice muffled. "I can ride."

"Of course you can."

They went on.

"You think I'm a fool."

"I don't," said Alex, who had been thinking that precise thing.

"Or a child. I'm neither."

"You're certainly, ah. Inexperienced."

"Not as much as you'd think. It's my uncle's mare, is the problem, and he won't let me out on her, usually."

"You're lucky she's not harmed, then. But how will you explain your injury?"

"I'll tend it myself." His arms were relaxed now, hands clasped. "I've experience in that, at least."

"Ah," said Alexander. He cleared his throat. "The dew is clearing off the grasses; it looks to be a fine day."

"I'm not as young as you think I am."

"I never said you were young."

"I know a lot."

"I'm sure that you do."

"I was accepted to Princeton, you know. But they wouldn't take me."

Well, that stung. Alexander had applied to Princeton -- and been denied. "Whyever not? Your chin is terribly pointed; could you move it a bit?" The young man, who was not Princeton-bound, shifted his chin. It only moved the pain to another area. Alex tried not to wiggle.

"That's my uncle's house, just over that rise. You can let me down here."

"On a broken, or a twisted ankle? Don't be ridiculous. It's easily another mile. I'll take you in."

"I'm not a lady, needing to be treated with kid gloves."

"You're a nuisance," said Alexander, honestly enough. "But I'm not cruel."

"Sometimes," said the young man, "what appears to be kindness, is in fact -- oh Lord. Oh mercy." He drew back. "Please stop here and let me off."

"What is it?"

"My uncle."

Alex reined in. "Do you fear him that much?"

"He'll have my hide for this. And it'll be worse if he knows about you. Please."

"It was an accident. He shouldn't --"

"Taking his horse was no accident. Will you --"

"Yes, of course," and Alex dismounted; he reached up to steady the boy, who flinched with the feeling of hands on his hips. It made something react in Alexander too -- something wary. He hadn't been inclined to take the boy seriously about losing his hide and fearing his uncle, but this flinching-back was automatic in him; it meant something more than a normal whipping. "Let me speak to him. I'll clear your name."  
But the boy -- the young man, he reminded himself, no matter how slight his form -- was shaking his head, testing his footing, pulling a face at the pressure. "You'd do more harm than good. I'll be well enough. Thank you," and he looked up. "Have I thanked you yet? I thank you. For the ride, and the help, and -- and for your discretion." He fumbled at his waist.

"For god's sake, it's just a few miles. Put away your coin, lad. Do I look so poor as that? -- Nevermind, nevermind. Don't answer that. But tell me your name, so I can at least ..." What was he saying? Why did he want this? "So I can ..."

"So you can not ask after me?" The young man smiled at him -- a real smile. "I'm twenty, you know. Not a child any longer. I don't need looking after. I'm quite old enough to handle my own affairs."

"I'm Hamilton," said Alexander, disturbed and not seeking the root of that disturbance.

"Aaron. Aaron Burr."

They shook hands.

Aaron hooked the traitorous lock of hair behind his ear. His eyes were very bright and his mouth was broad and his hands, Alexander noticed, were fine and tapered and uncalloused. "Thank you. Again."

Alex nodded. Take care, he wanted to say. I'll come to call, he wanted to say. But Aaron wasn't a lady, so Alex held his tongue and wondered at himself as Aaron moved further away, ever towards the figure waiting in the stableyard; he wondered as he watched Aaron be cuffed around the head and pushed to the ground; and he wondered more, with a crawling sense of dis-ease, as he waited impatient for the young man to rise again.

*

This was not the first dance of the season, nor the last, therefore it was of less importance; therefore (Alexander argued with himself) he could make an appearance without making too much of a spectacle of himself. Surely. Probably. Anyway, he hoped so. He wanted food and alcohol and conversation, not ...  
And once at the dance, it was soon enough that he wanted none of those things. He slipped into an alcove with a bowl of punch and a slight moan, because here at least it was quieter, and for a moment he was alone --

But only a moment. A young woman came in back-first, muttering under her breath and through her teeth every step of the way. The room was small, she nearly trod on him, and Alexander tried to step out of the way at the same moment she turned around -- and he dropped his cup in frank surprise at the same moment she let out a more audible swear.  
They both stared at the mess a moment, neither moving to clean it.

She recovered first. "Mr Hamilton."

"Mr Burr," he said. "I mean -- is it -- that is --"

"That works as well as any other." She cleared her throat. "My name is Burr, sir."

"Your Christian name, I take it, is not Aaron."

"E-R-I-N, rather" she said, and attempted a smile and a curtsy at the same time. "Pleased to make your acquaintance, sir. Again."

"On more solid ground," he said, cruelly. "And without any dew."

Burr took a deep breath; she scrubbed her hands on her skirts. "Mr Hamilton, I did not intend to mislead you --"

"As you did not intent to steal your uncle's horse?"

"I returned her. That is hardly theft."

"You made me think -- you wore breeches, for god's sake!" And he felt a heat rise over his face, remembering.

"You didn't ask!"

"Oh, am I supposed to ask every charming-faced young man I meet what he really has between his legs, in case --"

"Charming?" she said, in disbelief: and then "I beg your pardon --"

Alex felt hot. He hadn't intended to say that much. "Nevermind. Ignore that."

"It isn't any of your business, sir, but this mode of dress" and she gestured to her clothing, "is not -- it's not -- I am a man! It's just --"

"It's fine."

"You think I did any of this to mislead you? You think I care what you think? You think --"

He stepped forward and put a hand on her mouth. "Stop talking a moment. Please."

Her eyes were very wide.

Alexander held it there a moment longer.

Their bodies were very close; he felt it. "I don't understand," he said. "How can I? If you don't explain. But if you would trust me -- if you would tell me. Trust me enough to do that."

"How could I trust you?" said Burr, low.

"You already are. You already do. You have to trust me, don't you, or you'll pull yourself to pieces with worry."

Burr stared at him. "I don't like how you know this. How -- how do you know it?"

"That's a story for later. If you want it. Your choice now is whether or not you want to trust me a little more."

So Burr spoke, explaining (in a stumbling narrative that testified how rare this conversation was) how it was to wear the wrong clothes, be seen as the wrong sex; he told Alexander about his aunt and uncle and the dozen or so cousins at the supper-table, all clamoring for attention; he explained the freedom of an old pair of breeches and worn-out boots and a ride in the morning.

"Did he beat you?"

Burr shrugged. "It wasn't so bad."

Alexander didn't argue. He reached out, without meaning to do it, without knowing he had done it, and took Burr's hand. "Erin," he said, and corrected himself: "Mr Burr."  
That smile came out again; it really was disarming. "Mr Hamilton."

Alex looked down at their joined hands and did not move away. "I don't know what any of this means," he said.

"I suppose," said Burr, "your choice is whether or not you want to explore it."

"Would you?" said Hamilton.

And Burr shifted that few inches closer, and kissed him.

Hamilton felt himself smiling, tried to stop, and could not stop. "Aaron Burr. You taste just as I thought you would."

"You taste like punch," said Burr, and then "Wait -- what?"

"You heard me," said Alexander, laughing. "You know exactly what I said."


	47. the one with a ghost story (- whose ghost?)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 8 nov 17.

Winter is the time for ghost stories.

 

When he was a child, he often wakes at night to see the shape of a woman bending over him; he smells pipe smoke in the empty hallways, thick and curling and distantly familiar. He learns not to mention these things. He learns to be silent. Gradually the visions fade - if they were visions, if they happened at all.

And Burr is left alone again.

 

Studying by candlelight, his head nodding, and

“Aaron,” he hears

-hears himself replying _Theo, wait_

-and woke.

 

The water in the washbasin is frozen over. He breaks the ice, takes a breath of preparation, dips in his hands and washes them, washes his face, rubbing hard to clear sleep from off his skin.

The dreams won’t rub away so easily. They linger. They speak. _Our dear baby is dead,_ he hears

and _Alexander, please_

and _I’d rather be divisive ..._

-as soon as he wakes or moves or tries to recall something more, the dreams slip away.

 

And finally they stop.

 

He’s forgotten them entirely by the time he is grown up and signing the register to join up in the army.

He has no presentiments.

 

The midwinter forests of Quebec are cold - well, he expected that - and they are hungry.

The men are not hungry. They eat birds, squirrels, rabbit: whatever they can trap and skin and boil.

At night the forest breathes.

Burr lays awake in his sleeping roll. He waits.

It comes. A battle, lives lost and screams forgotten, blood scattered and frozen vibrant on the snow. The commander is shouting, and _I must speak to him_ thinks Burr but the man takes a bullet through the neck just as he opens his mouth to speak and his blood pours out forward over his raised hands like he can keep it in. He is dead before he can finish the gesture.

Burr stands still, bullets thick as flies.

 _I’d rather be divisive,_ someone says in his ear. _Drop the niceities._

He does. There is work to do, and better work.

 

“Burr - meet Hamilton.”

“We keep meeting,” laughs Alex.

Burr doesn’t answer. He’s heard all this before.

 

“Theodosia Prevost,” and she holds our her hand and the sea-wind whips her hair around her ears and he hears her voice saying _Our baby, our sweet baby, oh Aaron it was so fast_ and he does not care does not care he wants her wants her _wants_ —

 

“I’m married,” she tells him, early on.

Not for long, he thinks.

Burr does not say any of this. He only smiles at her, and (thank god) she smiles back.

 

“Alexander, please.”

It is winter — again. Weather drips down through his coat and scarf and gloves.

Hamilton is glaring. He’s angry enough, Burr thinks, that he should be melting the snow around him - instead it gathers on his shoulders and dusts his hair. “Leave me alone,” he says. “I can’t believe you’d do this.”

Burr shakes his head. He would like to shake Hamilton, but — “It’s a Senate seat. I didn’t kill anyone.”

 _“Take your paces,”_ says Alex, voice half-eaten by the wind.

Burr is cold, cold — “What?”

“The Senate races,” Hamilton says again, voice patiently slow, like he’s speaking to a child.

 

He expected their ending, when it came, to be cold. So he doesn’t recognize the July letters and the hot words they throw back and forth, doesn’t think anything of it at all  
until he hears his voice again saying

 _I must speak_ _to him_

and sees Alex fall

and bleed out on the snow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Theodosia & Burr had at least one child who died at birth and one daughter (Sally) who died as a young child.
> 
> -"I must speak to him," said Burr, standing in shock after he shot Hamilton.


	48. the one in which there is no question of what you deserve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sleepy sad snuggly boyfriends. hanging out in London and trying to make amends. poorly.
> 
> ... based on the fic ["A More Perfect Union" written by the more-perfect-than-me Holograms.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7233154)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 4 June 2017.

Burr takes forever to fall asleep -- he's restless, adjusting sheets and cursing the duvet and swearing there are bedbugs and opening the window only to close it a few minutes later -- but once sleeping, he's dead to the world.  
  
That might be the laudanum he's been taking, of course. Except Alex threw the bottle out the window during their last fight. And then Burr swore in French with such fluent vitriol, Alex had actually laughed - "Have you been taking lessons?" -- and then Burr knocked everything off the table, ink jars included, and Alex shouted to see his unsent letters splattered and ruined, and Burr shouted back something about keeping a knife in his boot, and Alex said --  
  
He is sleeping beautifully peaceful now, this Aaron Burr. Wretched man. It hurts something in Alex's side just to look on him. Yes yes the duel yes, of course, but that had happened almost three years ago --  so he's begun to wonder if this pain is only obliquely connected to that July.  
  
It surely has everything to do with Burr.  
  
After they fought, they fucked -- and took a walk, a lazy pace through the woods, proper for a pair of old men. Burr had pulled Alex into a shady spot and kissed him hot and slow, not grinding but not letting more space between them, either.  
  
Finally Alex pulled back. He was flushed, excited. Startled, too: usually Burr wasn't one for public displays.

Alex had tried to laugh: "You’re done already?"

Burr was looking down the lane: another couple approaching. "Sorry," he said.  
  
"For what?"  
  
Burr didn't answer.  
  
"Cocktease," said Alex, not meaning it. And Burr didn't answer that either.  
  
Now he lays curled on his side, fingers twitching. And he's whimpering. Not the good kind.   
  
( _What do you dream about when you have those nightmares?_ Alex asked once. _My mistakes,_ Burr said.)  
  
He is beautiful. Alex wants to wake him and does not. He wants to kiss him awake -- to stroke him until he's hard, change those anguished noises to a better sort of cry.  
  
He does not.   
  
Burr thinks this is his penance; he thinks (he has said) that he doesn't deserve happiness, nor kindness, nor the feeling of Alexander's mouth on him --  
  
( _Should I stop?_  asked Alex, with no intention of stopping, and _Fuck no fuck me fuck me please Alex please,_  Burr said. Convincing proof)  
  
\-- and Alex won't argue. Not like this. Not when Burr is showing everything he's normally desperate to hide, his guilt and fear and the agony of strained desire written on him, large as a signature at the bottom of a letter. He is finally honest, here and now, and he is finally close enough to touch.


	49. the one in the future.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> they’ve both grown old.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 12 November 2016

Years and years after the duel, and it is July again. Another July.

Neither one of them much remembers to acknowledge the date anymore - neither with respectful silence nor any other commemoration. Burr had once suggested an anniversary party, laughing: but Alex did not laugh. It was the sort of joke he only liked to hear from himself.

So. July, and the days are long and sleepy and hot, starting early in the morning and stretching on with an endless dreamlike clarity of separate images: the shape of shadows mixed with green oak leaves; a child’s finger dragging under a line of printed text; the tremulous shuffling stride of an inchworm across the page.

Burr’s head aches. He rests it against the tree-trunk and listens to his great-grandson read aloud, clumsy over the new words.

“A-aw-aw-“

“Awful,” says Alex, following along. He raises his eyes over the tow head and smiles at Burr.

Burr does not smile. He is thinking of the date, thinking of churchyards and memorials, the way moss grows over stones while your back is turned - while you step out of the street and out of the rain and into a shop, maybe admiring a new hat. You forget to mourn a moment and the writing is all worn away on the headstone, and you’ve forgotten the shape of her smile.

Hamilton isn’t smiling now. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“It’s never _nothing_ ,” says Alex, “not with you.”

“Is that a criticism? or a complaint?”

“An observation. Why are you so prickly? You’re welcome to go inside, if the heat bothers you.”

“It’s not the heat.”

Alexander looks away from Burr and out, out.

The world is different now. Trains, and electricity, - even piped water, cold and hot, inside the house. Alex has a passion for invention. He was very interested in having gas lights installed, insisting that the steady glow was better for aging eyes than dim candlelight; it was a good argument and may have won the day until Eliza read about the lamps’ nasty habit of smothering entire households before anyone could rise and open a window.

It’s true that her eyes are older - and so are Hamilton’s - and so are Burr’s. He wears spectacles all the time now. A blow to his pride, which has taken enough blows to make it resemble a very worn, very lumpy feather-pillow.  
He tells himself that his pride doesn’t matter - reading new books, seeing the faces of his dear ones - that’s what matters. But he’s not always certain of the bargain.

The landscape is different too. The pond is dried up into a smooth dimple, dotted just now with flowers; the old trees are dead and new ones planted.

Vines and fig trees, thinks Burr.

Alex interrupts his thoughts - as he does so often, still. Much has changed and much remains constant. “What did I do?”

His voice is gentle. Not like - not like it had been thirty years ago, on this same date. _What did I say?_ he’d written, not interested in the reply. _And can you prove it? And was I wrong?_

 _Weehawken_ , said Burr.

“You haven’t done anything wrong,” says Burr: and Alex listens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Burr did live long enough to dandle great-grandbabies on his knee, but whether or not he did —?
> 
> Hamilton had been dead for thirty years by then.


	50. the one where Alex has a nightmare

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 6 March 2017.

"Alex, Alex -- Alexander -- shhh --"

 

Hamilton's heart is beating fast and thick and unsteady; Burr can feel the rough throb at his wrists where he's holding on and for a moment Alexander's eyes don't quite focus and Burr is so afraid. It's deep and violent -- and it doesn't matter how he feels, he can't take the time to look at it right now, he pushes it down and away and holds this man in his arms. Hamilton is a thrashing nervousness. Hamilton, he thinks.  _Alexander_.

"I'm here," he finds himself saying. He doesn't see why it should matter -- doesn't examine why he's saying it -- but Alex quiets. He's still shaking but now he's making signs of consciousness too: he's licking his mouth and swallowing down whatever taste is in his mouth and opening and closing his hand on Burr's arm. And because the words are working, Burr repeats himself: "I'm here," he says.

Alex tries to speak. His voice hitches. He tries again. "Here."

"Yes."

"You're here."

"Yes."

"You won't leave me," says Alex, and he bursts into tears and hides his face against Burr's neck and for a second Burr thinks Alex is ashamed -- of the dream, of the tears -- but Alex wraps his arms around Burr's waist and drags in slow breaths that shudder through his body and through Burr's too.

It startles Burr. His mind stops working, then starts up again with a lurch. Hamilton isn't trying to hide his embarrassment; he's seeking comfort. He's curled around Burr, drawn up tight, like certain plants shut their leaves during rainstorms. And his heart-rate is slowing now: Burr can feel it, how his breath slows and his tears stop.

"Aaron. You won't leave me. You'll stay."

 

Yes yes yes yes O yes

 

 


	51. the last one

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 24 February 2017.

 

Burr rubbed between his brows. "Alright. We're going to try this one more time, and then I swear to god I'm going to just leave and go visit 'Celia--"

Protestations from both parties. Alex was complaining about his cock. Eliza was complaining about Alexander's complaints. "It is ridiculous," she said to him, "that you feel the need to have attention lavished on your member at every moment of the day."

"There are two of you! It's not like you need to both be on me at the same time -- you can alternate days, or --"

"Hamilton, stop. You're the most selfish person I have ever met."

"You're the selfish one," Alex started, and when they turned an identical expression on him, he actually blushed, and laughed: "Fine. I'll be quiet. But no more threats from Aaron."

Eliza waited -- to make certain he would in fact be quiet -- and said: "Burr?"

"Accede, counsel. No more threats. So -- Eliza, you want ..."

"Attention," she said, promptly. "Not every time or even every day, but a good amount of the time."

Burr smiled at her.

Alex made a face. He didn't like to see Burr's smile turned on his wife.

And then Burr said "Anything specific?" -- and he was still smiling, that bastard.

And Eliza blushed.

"I thought so," said Burr.

"Don't look at my wife like that!"

"Alex --"

"And don't you look at Burr like that either."

Burr thought that was very funny; Alex returned to glaring at him.

Eliza rolled her eyes at her husband. She said to Burr: "We're doing this wrong."

And she stood up, and started to work on the buttons leading down her bodice.

"Uh."

"Betsey?"

"I'm not sure --"

"What did I say about looking at her?"

"This is entirely your fault to begin with, Hamilton! You're the instigator! If you're going to get like this every time, I'll --"

"You promised not to threaten to leave!"

"I was going to threaten to shoot you again," snapped Burr.

"Stop it, both of you," and Eliza tugged down her sleeves, stepped out of her dress; she rubbed her bare arms, then crossed them over her chest. "Who's next?"

"Don't you dare," said Alex, but Burr was undressing, and -- 

Eliza went over, took a deep breath, and rose on her toes to kiss him. It lasted a while. Alex watched with some annoyance -- and some interest -- as Burr's stiff posture relaxed and his hands came up to cup her chin and she moved a tiny bit closer and rested her hands on his hips and -- 

"Alright, alright. That's enough."

Burr lifted away; he made a face. He didn't seem to think it was enough. "Are you jealous?"

For answer, Alex jerked Burr to himself and kissed him hard, moving from mouth to jaw to neck, until Burr gasped and pulled away and swore.

"Language."

Eliza said: "Try it again."

So they did.

She reached in between then and rubbed -- petted, really.

Alex moaned against Burr's mouth. "More?"

"You keep kissing him. I'll keep --" She squeezed. 

Alex whimpered, and arched, and obeyed.

It didn't take long until they were stripping him down -- and found four hands to be far more efficient than two -- and Alex was moaning more loudly, and pleading. Someone (Eliza) had blindfolded him with a cravat; someone (probably Burr) was rubbing over his cock with a rough thumb and a damp palm, and someone was biting his nipple and someone was running fingers up and down his side and there was the smell of the people he loved most nearby, and --

"Burr?"

"We can gag you, too," said Burr -- there was a familiar hitch in his voice.

Alex thrust forward, seeking and not finding friction. Why had they stopped touching him? "Is she touching you?"

"Alexander, does that matter? Are you getting what you want?"

"Yes, but --"

"Do you care what's happening to Burr?"

"No, but --"

Burr said something low, and Eliza laughed and made a soft noise, and then there was a certain smell he knew very well, and -- "Are you being good to my wife?"

"Mm," said Burr.

Eliza made another sound. "More?"

"One or two?"

"One. Two. Two, please? Oh."

"That was one," said Burr, voice muffled. 

_(that's a pun! because "muff" is slang for lady-parts, okay, and)_

"No one is tending to me," said Alex.

And Eliza -- always obedient -- put her hand on him, and he knew it was Eliza (he thought) because he was pretty sure where Burr's hands were, and he heard his wife gasp out loud and her hand jerked and tightened on him and it was like he could feel what Burr was doing to her, through her, through how she was touching him -- he felt when Burr put another finger into Eliza, he felt when Burr pressed his thumb against that sensitive place and when he bent his head to taste her -- and how that felt -- he'd never thought it might be different to be a woman than a man in these things but Eliza was shaking and swallowing and still trying to do something kind for him, bless her, and it must be different because his mind was going blank and -- god god god --

 

Dimly he heard Betsey saying something quiet and pleading and Burr answering, laughing -- heard him shifting his clothes -- heard her mumble, and Burr choke, and she hummed, and Burr moaned out loud and Alex was jealous -- he wanted to do that -- but distant -- distant. He heard Burr come; he heard his wife swallow.

"Jesus fuck," said Burr, and

"Where do you think Alex got it from?" said Mrs Hamilton, rather smug. "Alex? How are you doing?

He surfaced, briefly. "Um."

"Was that acceptable to your majesty?"

"Sure. Yeah. Yes. It was nice, Bess."

"Just nice?"

"Exceptional. You're a marvel. Both of you."

"And you're alright with what A-- what Burr did?"

"If you're happy, I'm happy," he said, sleepy and demure. "Burr? Do you need to visit a whore tonight?"

Hands at the back of his head, and the blindfold slipping up as a mouth pressed over his own -- Burr's mouth on his mouth, Burr's tongue licking at his lips -- Burr's cock soft and sweet and near to hand. He admired it. His lover. His Aaron. So kind. So dear. So good to all of them. Good Burr, he thought.

"If either of you talks any more about whores, I'll shoot you both," said Eliza. "Get dressed. We promised the girls we'd take them to the theatre in an hour."


	52. the one that happens in darkness, outside an inn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I have been looking for you,” Hamilton said.

There is absolutely no point in denying it, not when Hamilton has got a hand down the front of his trousers, but Burr tries to laugh it off anyway. Until Hamilton kisses him and his hips rock forward of their own accord and Alex is moaning under his mouth, his hands, and Burr didn’t want this before tonight but now he cannot imagine going back. How did he live, before he knew how a man’s broad, calloused hand felt on his cock — so different from his own and so similar.

How can he live after it’s over? Because Alex is biting down on his bottom lip and swearing, sweating, saying _Yes Burr yes yes_ as Burr unties his breeches and, hesitating only a second, kneels in the mud and worse behind the tavern. He takes this tender part in his mouth and swallows around it, thanked by a rough noise and a bitter taste and the thrum of Alexander’s hot blood, his voice saying _Aaron, I knew it, I was looking for you because I knew._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello.


	53. the one with Laurens

_Unalterably_ , Alex had written once, ten years ago. Before he learned his lover was married, and had a child.

 _It doesn’t matter,_ Laurens said, tracing his finger along the path of Alexander’s upper lip. _It doesn’t matter. I am yours._

Laurens had really said that. He’d never write it down but he would say the words, in the moments after orgasm or in the soft evening starlight, when hope felt possible.

And Alex, helpless, echoed it back. _Yours, I am yours, yours forever._

When the bullet went through Laurens’ neck, Alex heard it; he thought he would never stop hearing it. Those restless hands, stilled.

 _Yours,_  they had said.

So Alex flinches when Burr runs a thumb over his mouth, and there is a moment of duality — a splitting — but he wants this, he does, he _wants_ it, and he finds on Burr what he wants to find. He finds it familiar, the hardening and the sticky, sweet wet.

It feels like a betrayal to be here and to want this.

But.

Burr’s skin moves against him and Burr’s breath is hot in his ear and now he is gripping Alex too, and there is that split-self feeling again

but the world is spinning tight around them and as Alex gasps aloud he hears it again between them though neither spoke; marveling he touches the rough sure line of Burr’s mouth, fallen open and lax; he finds again in the silence between them the words he knows, the echo that repeats. _Yours, yours. I am yours._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in actual history, John Laurens was the one who wrote “unalterably”. 
> 
> it is such a departure from his usual clumsy closeted flailing-about writing style, that i feel justified in assuming the word is from Alexander.
> 
> anyway. i hate Laurens for his lies & cowardice towards our sad lovely wide-eyed Alex. Hamilton. how dare he hurt such a baby.
> 
> *
> 
> here i am dragging Laurens for his shitty writing and i post this comma-riddled mess. hypocrisy, thy name is Carrot.


	54. the one where Eliza is thirsty af

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eliza always said she wouldn’t marry a soldier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> written 4/7/18, for a sad peach. not that it helps. but.

Elizabeth Schuyler always said she would never marry a soldier. Her sisters teased her about it — she wasn’t the eldest, she wouldn’t inherit, so she couldn’t expect anything much in a husband, surely. And there didnt seem to be anything much in her either. She wasnt the bravest (that was Peggy) or the wittiest (Angelica) or the prettiest (Peggy, again, perhaps to compensate for her courage and help get her out of scrapes).

But it didn’t seem to much matter. When they were girls playing dolls in the front courtyard, all soldiers were British and so were the Schuylers.

Then she grew up: and the war came. Like that, like a thunderbolt.

The new army, however, did not inspire great confidence. They had uniforms (some of them) and weapons (most of them), but half were old men and half were green boys, and anyway, (she complained), none of this seemed to have very much to do with her. Why should they break from the King?

“He’s a villain,” said Angelica, from her newspaper. “He’s a thief.”

“We owe him allegiance. And in return, he gives us safety. Like Papa. When we obey his rules —“

“Oh, so you’re going to tell him that you went down to the docks last week?”

Eliza blushed. “I told you that in confidence.”

“Did you see anything nice?” asked interested Peggy. “It was a warm day. Did the men disrobe?”

Eliza took up her stitching. “Obedience is safe.”

“Obedience,” said her sister, “is boring.”

Boring, however, was a price she was willing to pay for safety. Comfort. Security. She would let Angelica chase the wealthy men and Peggy fall for a soldier; she, herself, would marry someone solidly middle-class. A merchant-sailor, maybe. Then he would be gone for conveniently long periods of time. The epoch of wedded bliss.

So it was with no great sense of trepidation or interest that she waited, cinched tight at the waist, while her maid fixed her hair in the fashionable way and dusted it all over with pale-blue powder. It matched her dress and it matched her eyes and that, at least, would be enough for tonight.

Angelica dressed more quickly but with no less attention, but Peggy barely gave herself a glance. What did it matter how she looked? she said, unusually sullen. “I’ll end up dancing with a poor soldier, no one is interested in me —“

“You’re too young to worry about such things.”

“You’re only four years older!”

And Angelica said, with the charming demeanor of older sisters: “Four years age and ever so much greater in experience.”

Eliza watched her sweep from the room and wondered almost idly if Angelica had intended that innuendo.

The house was hot hot hot hot, despite having all windows open to the winter air. Candles and eager men brightened the room, and she moved among them easily, lightly. A butterfly in silk.

She was leaning out a window and trying to catch her breath after a reel when she heard her sister laugh.

A real laugh. Not one of her fake oh-aren’t-you-clever laughs she gave to monied young men, and not one of the wisely adult laughs she gave to monied widowers.

And she was talking to a soldier.

Eliza stared. He didn’t look like anyone, or anything, particularly — he looked tired and hungry and eager and pitiably young, like all of them; too young to be dying in a field somewhere for such a stupid, frivolous cause as freedom against a King no one had ever met ... but he wore the now-familiar cutaway coat, and his nose had an aquiline angle, and when he turned sharp eyes to see who was staring at him she did not pretend to feel ashamed.


	55. the one that happens a few years later

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> so ... HamBurrLiza is a thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy birthday, o thou peachest.
> 
> here’s to making the middle more important than the end.

So.

They are all getting older. Eliza stops bleeding every month — which is normal, it’s natural, she expected this — and yet.

It’s hard to see Rita toddling around and know that she’s the last baby; know that she’ll never again feel the kicking flutter, the worry and pride of holding something new inside her.

It’s harder to explain all this to Alex.

He doesn’t notice for a while — and when he does, he needs several explanations from her, and a long talk with Burr with the door shut, and finally (she expects) a good cry alone in his office.

“It’s not just you,” Burr says, when they walk together that evening: it’s an old habit by now. Sometimes Alex joins them, but more and more his hip aches him by the end of the day, and they go out alone under the soft twilight sky. “He doesn’t want to admit he’s getting older, himself.”

“So proud,” says Eliza.

Burr doesn’t disagree. “Fear too, I think.”

“Of dying?”

He laughs out loud. “Have you met Hamilton? No. He’s afraid of being ill. Bedridden. Losing ... all this.” Without looking at her, he adds: “Losing us.”

“He’s lost so much already.”

Burr shrugs. “It isn’t the losing. It’s his inability to accept it.“

“Not everyone has the famous Burrian equamity. He blames himself for these things. When Philip died, and Angie — was lost, ...”

“I know.”

“I miscarried, too. And I — i blamed myself, but he thought he was somehow responsible. Like he’d put something foul in me.”

“He would think that. He’s so —“

“Don’t be rude. He tries.”

“Yes. Which is more than I do, as a general rule.”

“Stop that,” she said, laughing at him.

Burr was quiet a moment. “I had children die, too. As well as Theodosia. And it was terrible, terrible — I loved her desperately — but I knew she was going, and what could I do but wait with her?”

She stopped walking and he did too, her arm linked through his.

Fireflies rose from the grass, lighting briefly and dropping back down, seeking.

“Alex doesn’t like to wait.”

“He does not. So I hope, for his sake, that the end is swift. But Aaron — you and I — we know the ending, when it comes, doesn’t matter as much as what happens in the middle.”


End file.
